 On June 2, thousands of activists protested in the Pisa region of Italy against the plan of the Mario Draghi government to build a military base in the village of Coltano. Protesters condemned the fact that resources were being spent for military purposes at a time when there was dire need for social expenditure and highlighted the fact that the Pisa region was already highly militarized. So why is the Draghi government planning yet another base in the region? What is the extent of militarization in the region? Maurizio Coppola of Puteru Al Popolo explains. So yeah, the demonstration was against the building and the announcement of the government to build a new military base in Coltano. It's near Pisa in the region of Tuscany and that's a region already highly militarized. We remember that there are four other military bases already in this region and that should be the fifth one. We remember one of the four military bases is Camp Darby. It's a very well-known military base in the region of Pisa where it was built in 1951 in an agreement between Italy and the United States after the Second World War. And it is today still one of the most important military base of the US in the European continent and in the Italian territory. So this military base announced for Coltano, it's in the middle of a green area. It should be like 74 hectares of land destroyed for building this military base. And you remember 74 hectares are like 100 football fields. So it's a huge territory, a huge area, a green area. It's a natural resource that should be destroyed for this military base. The second thing, it's also like the coasts. It costs more or less the government is presenting 190 million euros for the building of this military base. But of course, we know that the costs are already always higher. We are calculating like at least 300 million euro. And the point is that the Italian government wants to take this money from the next generation EU COVID-19 recovery fund. So it is money that should go enter into the public health care sector that should help social question to solve social question questions. But in the context of this militarization of Europe of the Ukraine war, the government declared that it will take the money from this fund. Of course, the main arguments are that we need now in this time of insecurity and of war, we need a new military base that the military base in the region will also open job opportunities and so on. But what is hiding in this argument is that this military base is already planned since years. It's a project that is older than one year and so it is not the context of insecurity produced by the war in Ukraine that is pushing the government to open a new military base. But it's a longer project of militarization of the Italian territory. And this is something that the people, the people from the area, the anti-imperialist movements, anti-capitalist movements didn't accept and so on June 2nd or June 2, there was a huge demonstration in the area where this military base should be built. And it is very important that the people, that the popular struggle is starting now. There is also in the parliament an opposition, it is a little opposition. It's the group around Manifesta, it's the parliamentarian group in which also Potehral Popolo is represented and they also made an intervention in the parliament to stop this crazy project. In the aftermath of the Ukraine war, the Draghi-led government has doubled down on a policy of militarization. What has been the military policy of success of Italian governments and what kind of resources have they spent on this? Yeah, I mean the militarization of Italy, it's something that is not you but of course the Ukraine war is accelerating the militarization then the Draghi government is like moving on different levels. One of the first level it's like, we can summarize this intervention of Draghi in a very simple way. Draghi is reproducing the hard line promoted by Washington by sending soldiers for the NATO missions in Eastern Europe and by weaponizing the conflict by sending weapons to Kiev. These are the two main characteristics of the politics of Mario Draghi currently and the different levels are like, for example, in the first months of the conflict in the Ukraine, so in the months of March, more than 180 million euro were spent to reinforce the missions of Italy in Eastern Europe. We are speaking about NATO missions already existing before in Romania, in Latvia, but also in the Eastern Mediterranean Sea and then there are like new soldiers sent in these territories. We speak about 3,500 soldiers and in the next months should reach these military missions organized by NATO of course and then there are also other missions they are starting, they are developing and it's two missions above all in Bulgaria and in Hungary with around 100,500 soldiers that should be sent there and of course there is the question of war, but of course there is also like the militarization of the external border of Europe, so also like controlling all the migrant flows coming from Eastern Europe. This is one thing. Then the second thing, it's the in general increase of military spending in Italy. The government announced that they will reach 2% of GDP in military spending in the next years. Of course, they are like following the indications of the US and NATO and today in 2022, 2021-22 Italy spent more or less 26 billion euro for the military, but of course this spending, this increasing will like affect a lot the budget of the Italian states and we speak about 38 billion that should be reached in 2028, so there is an increase of at least 12 billion for the moment. In a context that is really, I mean it's absurd because we are having a huge discussion about the income support working poor are getting or poor people are getting in Italy and from left to right, the center left to the far right, all of the parties are attacking poor people working poor because they are getting some income support that is like at the total, it's like 7 billion per year, so like the military spending, the increasing of the military spending, it's much higher of what poor people are getting and this is like a picture that represents really what is going on in Italy and what kind of politics the Draghi government is conducting. We speak about income support that is really low at the moment, Italy does not have a minimal wage, a minimum wage, there is a campaign starting now in this context also from leftist organizations and the Bofol, Poterello Popolo and the USB Union for asking a minimum wage, minimum wage of at least 10 euros per hour because there are still in Italy 5 million people earning less than 10,000 euro per year, so it is not possible and this is the main point that the Italian government is now militarizing a conflict, putting like creating insecurity in Europe but also in Italy, increasing military spending and on the other side of the society, like criminalizing poor people, putting pressure even more on workers, on working poor and in this context, I mean in the first days of the announcement also of the war and of the involvement of Italy in this war because Italy is totally involved by sending heavy weapons and missile systems to Kiev, the armed producers, the stock prices skyrocketed, so Leonardo, one of the main company producing arms in Italy, in the couple of days their stock prices doubled, so war is not affecting everyone in the same way, poor people working poor, working people are getting under pressure, they are criminalized and so on and on the other side there are companies, the big capital of the armed producers, their stock prices and their profits skyrocketing. Italy has also been an integral part of NATO for decades and has played a key role in the expansion of the alliance. What has been Italy's role in NATO? Yeah, I mean Italy historically has a very fundamental role in the military alliance in the North Atlantic Treaty because of the geography, I mean Italy is in the middle of the Mediterranean Sea, a Mediterranean Sea that is highly militarized and still today we have military exercises organized and under control of the NATO going on, in Sardinia, in the island, in the western part of Italy, the beaches were closed for several weeks because there are military exercises organized by NATO with the full involvement of Italy, France and the United States. At the same time in Cigonella, in Sicily it's the island in the south of Italy near the Maghreb coast, intelligence operations drones are starting from Cigonella, it's a military base from Italy but in which also US aviation is hosted and from which NATO operations are organized. So Italy has military bases used by the US and by NATO forces, they are now used also for the interventions for supporting the military forces from Kiev against Russia and so Italy has a central role in the NATO alliance in the Mediterranean Sea but without a proper and without a known strategic orientation military and for the security of Europe. Italy and the driving government above all is just following and is submitted to what the US and what Biden is dictating and what the US is oriented and developing in this train war. So this is a huge problem and this is a huge problem that politically is also like coming up in Italy because on June 21 Mario Draghi will speak in the parliament for again relaunching a new financing for weapons to Ukraine and there are already parties saying it is enough there is like absolutely the right also supported by Putin in history like Matteo Salvini saying we have to stop the sending of arms to Kiev there are also other parties like the five star movement asking for a much much stronger diplomatic intervention of Italy and now like there is the democratic party supported by the far right of the brothers of Italy that will get a majority in the parliament and probably Italy will decide again a new financing of the military intervention of Italy in the Ukraine war. So this is more or less the situation and of course the popular movements are taking to the streets regularly and there is a very important political construction also that we have to face because today speaking about peace it's something very very complicated because all the parties in the parliament supporting the Draghi government supporting the militarization of conflict in Ukraine are presenting themselves as peace parties and it is very important that popular forces that leftist organizations and parties put content in this category of peace and this is the reason why we have to combine every day the revendication for peace also with the revendication and the demands for social justice because there is no peace without social justice.