Ron Paul: Disband NATO
This is Ron Paul’s statement before the US House of Representatives on House Resolution 997, “expressing the strong support of the House of Representatives for the North Atlantic Treaty Organization to enter into a Membership Action Plan with Georgia and Ukraine.”
Mr. Speaker, I rise in opposition to this resolution calling for the further expansion of NATO to the borders of Russia. NATO is an organization whose purpose ended with the end of its Warsaw Pact adversary. When NATO struggled to define its future after the Cold War, it settled on attacking a sovereign state, Yugoslavia, which had neither invaded nor threatened any NATO member state.
This current round of NATO expansion is a political reward to governments in Georgia and Ukraine that came to power as a result of US-supported revolutions, the so-called Orange Revolution and Rose Revolution. The governments that arose from these street protests were eager to please their US sponsor and the US, in turn, turned a blind eye to the numerous political and human rights abuses that took place under the new regimes. Thus the US policy of “exporting democracy” has only succeeding in exporting more misery to the countries it has targeted.
NATO expansion only benefits the US military industrial complex, which stands to profit from expanded arms sales to new NATO members. The “modernization” of former Soviet militaries in Ukraine and Georgia will mean tens of millions in sales to US and European military contractors. The US taxpayer will be left holding the bill, as the US government will subsidize most of the transactions. Providing US military guarantees to Ukraine and Georgia can only further strain our military. This NATO expansion may well involve the US military in conflicts as unrelated to our national interest as the breakaway regions of South Ossetia and Abkhazia in Georgia. The idea that American troops might be forced to fight and die to prevent a small section of Georgia from seceding is absurd and disturbing.
Mr. Speaker, NATO should be disbanded, not expanded.
Disband NATO!! Go Paul! « The Radical Mormon
April 1st, 2008 at 10:17 pm
[...] http://www.antiwar.com/blog/2008/04/01/ron-paul-disband-nato/ [...]
joe frm chi
April 1st, 2008 at 11:06 pm
When NATO struggled to define its future after the Cold War, it settled on attacking a sovereign state, Yugoslavia, which had neither invaded nor threatened any NATO member state.
–
Amen, Mr. Paul. Amen.
trans-mutant
April 2nd, 2008 at 12:28 am
No need to say anything else on this. The man has spoken the truth, as usual.
Eugene Costa
April 2nd, 2008 at 12:51 am
As usual, Paul seems to make some sense, but is shallow in his analysis. NATO never had any legitimate purpose and was an Anglo-American boondoggle from the getgo.
If anything it caused and perpetrated the “Cold War”. The French understood this.
Marcuse was a Marxist, but an extremely intelligent and penetrating critic. His analysis of political acronyms like “NATO”, as seemingly concrete entities, remains brilliant.
Brad Smith
April 2nd, 2008 at 12:55 am
Once again Ron Paul speaks truth to power. However, I doubt if they are listening. Fortunately, many of us are! Go Ron Paul! When enough sleeping sheeple wake up we just might take our country back.
Peace!
Jerry
April 2nd, 2008 at 1:37 am
Maybe we will run out of words 8:)
subHuman
April 2nd, 2008 at 2:09 am
NATO is Alliance of Evil led by anglo-american desire to enslave humanity and exploit natural resources of the planet.
Fortunately humanity is waking up to their schemes and resisting.
Eugene Costa
April 2nd, 2008 at 2:43 am
The attack on Yugoslavia spelled the end of NATO, as I said at the time.
It will take a few more years to unravel.
Afghanistan will speed up the end.
Giuliani’s ultimate clownishness was his call to admit Australia, India, Israel, Japan and Singapore.
Apparently there is some doubt where the Atlantic is.
The state of geography in America being what it is, it may be now confused with the great river Ocean that encircles Russia and China and keeps trying, with some success, to make them bosom buddies.
One supposes Putin in light moments contemplated an ultimatum, backed by threat of nuclear war, that Russia be allowed to join, making the only real enemy left the Communists on the Moon.
Actually, it is much more lucrative having Eastern Europe actually pay market price for their oil.
Eugene Costa
April 2nd, 2008 at 2:49 am
Merely by the way, Primakov was back in the news the other day on the matter of Kosovo.
Eugene Costa
April 2nd, 2008 at 3:19 am
Alas, strike one “actually”.
Ron Paul: Disband NATO | Ron Paul War Room
April 2nd, 2008 at 4:44 am
[...] http://www.antiwar.com/blog/2008/04/01/ron-paul-disband-nato/ Sphere: Related Content [...]
Andy
April 2nd, 2008 at 4:53 am
I agree 100% with every single thing Ron Paul has said. If only Americans had rallied to him. There is no candidate to vote for.
Catherine
April 2nd, 2008 at 5:50 am
Actually, Andy……..There is no candidate BUT Ron Paul to vote for! He’s still in the race for President and he will remain there until the bitter end. People highly underestimate his support base. Just wait until September!
Tess
April 2nd, 2008 at 6:08 am
Andy:
Ron Paul is still in the race, and we have picked up more delegates than the media is reporting. Please go to his website, and check out his schedule, he has a Freedom Tour scheduled, http://ronpaul2008.com. Do not believe what the mainstream media tells you, they are scared of him, and so are the big government folks. Ron Paul is still in this race, and will be at the September Convention.
Ron Paul is the only truth teller, and stands for our Constitution, and We The People.
Ron Paul has my vote and support now, and in November 2008.
Nike
April 2nd, 2008 at 6:16 am
Now hold on just one minute, Ron. I’ll admit that as NATO was formed to confront a presumed Soviet military menace – a ‘menace’ which no longer exists – that just perhaps getting rid of the organization makes sense. But if so, where but in the US would Bush get foot soldiers for his endless wars? With the majority of UN members refusing to play the part of servile American war puppet, Bush NEEDS NATO to lend a veneer of international credibility to his actions.
Think twice before you disappoint The Decider.
Rita Hill
April 2nd, 2008 at 7:40 am
“NATO expansion only benefits the US military industrial complex, which stands to profit from expanded arms sales to new NATO members. The “modernization” of former Soviet militaries in Ukraine and Georgia will mean tens of millions in sales to US and European military contractors.”
-Ron Paul
NATO is an organization that fell victim to its own wordview, and will need to disband or re-invent itself, while people become liberated from the retrograde culture it tried to perpetuate.
The latter issue: recognizing retrogrde, as well as traditional culture, is the underlying dynamic, that is actualy a couner-intuitive benefit for keeping faithful communities in Europe, as well as America, and elsewhere.
-Rita Hill
Peradventure
April 2nd, 2008 at 7:45 am
NATO serves the interests of American Imperialism.
It was created to that end.
I hope Ron Paul somehow gets the nomination for Presidency.
He is, undoubtedly, our best and only hope.
I am not optimistic about our future as a country or for the survival of humanity
Kenneth
April 2nd, 2008 at 8:02 am
I have a hard time envisioning humanity, or at least human civilization, surviving this century in anything like its present form. How long do you give it?
John Lowell
April 2nd, 2008 at 8:40 am
“Ron Paul is still in the race, and we have picked up more delegates than the media is reporting …”
And he’s going to win, take over the machinery of the Republican Party, and set the country on fire, isn’t he Tess!! That’s the kind of guy he is!! Go Revolution!!!
Why here at the Clinic, we never cause our patients the pain of challenging core beliefs, Tess, but neither can we promise a cure for certain. We simply hope that you’ll find the sunroom accomodative. So, in the meantime, you just keep on keeping on, eh?
Eugene Costa
April 2nd, 2008 at 10:27 am
“A white-smocked, gray-haired man, with a crew cut and the big flat cheeks of a politician, Dr. Quilty perched on the corner of his desk, one foot dreamily and seductively rocking as he launched on a glorious long-range plan. He would first provide me with provisional plates until the gums settled. Then he would make a permanent set. He would like to have a look at that mouth of mine. He wore perforated pied shoes. He had not visited with the rascal since 1946, but supposed he could be found at his ancestral home, Grimm Road, not far from Parkington. It was a noble dream. His foot rocked, his gaze was inspired. It would cost me around six hundred. He suggested he take measurements right away, and make the first set before starting operations. My mouth was to him a splendid cave full of priceless treasures, but I denied him entrance.
‘No,’ I said, ‘On second thoughts, I shall have it all done by Dr. Molnar. His price is higher, but he is of course a much better dentist than you.’”
[Vladimir Nabokov]
John Lowell
April 2nd, 2008 at 11:20 am
Ah, yes, Eugene Costa!
You know, I think I’d much rather have my plates done by Dr. Molnar too, and for the very same reason.
John Lowell
April 2nd, 2008 at 11:39 am
It is perhaps instructive even today to review Josef Stalin’s response to Churchill’s “Iron Curtain” speech in a Pravda interview in 1946. One extracts tender morsels here for tasting:
http://www.cnn.com/SPECIALS/cold.war/episodes/02/1st.draft/pravda.html
liberranter
April 2nd, 2008 at 2:09 pm
Kenneth:
“Civilization”, as we’ve traditionally understood it, particularly in the Western sense of the word, swallowed the metaphorical cyanide capsule sometime back in the mid-twentieth century, if not a bit earlier. It must have been a slow-acting synthesis of said poison, because “civilization” has been slowly thrashing about in its agonized death throes ever since, growing slowly and progressively weaker with each passing decade. I’d give it another fifty years, tops, although that is probably an overly generous estimate.
peace
April 2nd, 2008 at 2:16 pm
And, I ask, what do you think will follow our present form of human civilization? I look forward to your answers, please.
Eugene Costa
April 2nd, 2008 at 2:24 pm
Excellent. Thanks for the link.
Did CNN do the translation do you suppose–”more superior”?
IHeartRonnie
April 2nd, 2008 at 2:58 pm
Ron Paul is the only real American left. He is more important than Jesus to our daily lives. The rEVOLution is moved beyond just a political run, we are more powerful than a religion now. The rEVOLution has taken all our hearts and souls. Paul is the only person who can bring peace to this world. Put your faith in him, not ancient religions or old pieces of paper.
John Lowell
April 2nd, 2008 at 3:12 pm
God knows, Eugene, I don’t. It seemed to me interesting to see that some of Stalin’s concerns as expressed here are not at all unlike those to which Putin has given voice. One must allow for the ideologizing and the distance in time, of course, but that done, the thrust of the remarks in both cases are remarkably consonant: The clear sense of a threat to Russia from the West. Who would take seriously today claims of a missile threat to the Czech Republic or Poland from Iran? Far more plausible are Putin’s concerns. Are we ever to be done with the bellicosity? Might we expect an Obama Administration to continue on with the missile installations?
cfountain72
April 2nd, 2008 at 3:13 pm
You are right to support RP (as do I), but he would disagree with your statement. For he puts his faith in Him and His ancient religion. What makes Ron unusual is that he actually tries to follow Jesus’s teachings.
Peace be with you.
cfountain72
April 2nd, 2008 at 3:25 pm
I would say it fell victim to its own success, thank God. Like the [pick any disease] lobby, if that disease is ever cured, they will look around and say what are we to do now? But Ron is right as usual (as are you): NATO has served its purpose. To that organization I say: thank you, now go home.
Peace be with you.
Eso
April 2nd, 2008 at 3:39 pm
I suspect that cloning will have something to do with it, since to exist a society of clones needs absolute peace and stabile society. We must reduce our human numbers down to about 2 billion. I rather see us deflate our destructive economies gradually with a natural rather than violent loss of human life. We need to eliminate sex from reproduction and make it all eros. How? Probably a pill of sorts, perhaps a male infertility drug.
John Lowell
April 2nd, 2008 at 3:50 pm
Whatever good purpose Ron Paul’s political career may have served in the past is now so utterly sullied by the tripe and lickspittle issuing with such regularity from his bitter-end enthusiuasts that one wonders why it is that Paul himself doesn’t disown it. Are we to believe that Paul considers himself to be “more important than Jesus to our daily lives”? Is Paul personally the source of this kind of cultish drivel? Are there little girls involved? One can only hope that there are worried parents involved in cases such as the one above. Either that or a someone capable of administering electroshock.
David Terrasidius
April 2nd, 2008 at 7:35 pm
I was, oddly, enough saying this to myself today (as I often do) whilst watching the news, NATO served its purpose, keeping it going is only going to really profit Western Europe and the U.S but only financialy…and only through military arms sales. What kind of world are we becoming?
Once again Ron Paul speaks the truth. Im from UK btw. :)
Martin
April 2nd, 2008 at 8:49 pm
Unfortuneately, right as always. Remember, NATO was formed to keep off Soviet aggression against the West Europe. So, the cold war is over, and there is no enemy, but ourselves. We invaded Afghanistan, and Iraq, both had no army, no navy, and no air force. Even worse, we ask NATO to fight off a bunch of guys with AK’s in the middle of nowhere. Somehow, instead of kicking their butts, we are kickng our own, by wasting more of our lives, time, and money. We are the occupiers, and we were meant to be a republic, protecting ourselves from attacks such as 9/11, but we were to busy occupying Saudi Arabia, Kosovo, Germany, Japan, and Korea. Where is our morale? Where is our pride at? We all lost it, thanks to the government, sleeping in bed with corporates and big business. Somehow, the Constitution stands, and warns us correctly.
“Peace, trade, and honest friendship with all nation; Entangle alliances with none”.
freedomsadvocate.com » Blog Archive » Ron Paul in the News…Daily Digest 4/01/2008
April 2nd, 2008 at 8:55 pm
[...] Ron Paul: Disband NATO Antiwar.com – Redwood City,CA,USA This is Ron Paul’s statement before the US House of Representatives on House Resolution 997, “expressing the strong support of the House of Representatives … See all stories on this topic [...]
Eugene Costa
April 4th, 2008 at 4:49 pm
Isachenkov AP April 3, 2008] NATO pledged Thursday to embrace Ukraine and Georgia some day, but the failure to grant them a specific route to membership was a major foreign policy success for Putin just over a month before he steps down as president.
Hehe-”some day”–an echo of Putin’s echo of Jackie Gleason and Alice and the moon?
Eugene Costa
April 4th, 2008 at 5:02 pm
“Of course we can sometime in the future decide that some anti-missile defence system should be established somewhere on the moon, but before we reach such arrangements we will lose the opportunity for fixing some particular arrangements between us.”
[Vladimir Putin October 12, 2007]
Eugene Costa
April 4th, 2008 at 5:06 pm
“To the moon, Alice, to the moon!”
[Jackie Gleason]
One wonders whether Ms. Rice knows the Russian for BANG! ZOOM!?
Eugene Costa
April 4th, 2008 at 5:36 pm
Un jour Lara….
Winston Smith
April 5th, 2008 at 11:16 am
Of course NATO should be expanded to the ring of Saturn and further out… because there’s no limit to hubris.
Eugene Costa
April 5th, 2008 at 11:29 am
AP Sochi April 5, 2008: Bush also discussed the importance of security and stability in the Balkans, noting that at their summit in Romania, NATO leaders offered “intensified dialogue” to Bosnia and Montenegro, two other states once part of Yugoslavia.
“The NATO alliance is open to all countries in the region,” he said. “We hope that, soon, a free and prosperous Serbia will find its rightful place in the family of Europe and live at peace with its neighbors. With the changes under way in this region, Europe stands on the threshold of a new and hopeful history.”
Un jour, Lara. quand le vent a tourné–un jour, Lara, ton amour t’a quitté. Tes yeux, Lara. tes yeux!
Eugene Costa
April 5th, 2008 at 12:17 pm
From the The Autobiography of Condoleezza B. Toklas:
“Mr. Gates and myself met Mr. Putin and a few aides for lunch in the Kremlin cafeteria. The discussions over the missle shield to defend Pluto had been intense. My pantyhose was itching but I controlled myself and moved my chair far back from the formica table so that I could cross my left leg over my right.
I moved my left foot up and down slightly at the ankle. The sharp red leather toe was making my point for me.
Mr. Putin’s eyes brightened.
He said something in Russian, looking directly at me and by-passing the translator.
Mr. Putin knew I was fluent in Russian but he often mumbled or used a strange dialect that I could not understand.
I think what he said had the word “Hermitage” in it.
Mr. Gates’ translator whispered in his ear.
Mr. Gates then whispered in mine–”He’s asking you if you have ever visited the Hermitage.”
Mr.Gates’ translator apparently spoke the same dialect.
I nodded affirmatively with the toe of my red leather shoe and said in my best Russian: “Da, Mr. President, we have often visited Nashville. He was one of our greatest presidents. The Russian Federation president’s knowledge of American history is impressive.”
Mr. Putin clenched his teeth and smiled lightly. His eyes looked left and right. He looked at Mr. Gates before his eyes focused on the carbonate chandelier.
My attempt to break the ice on the missile shield seemed to be working.
Then suddenly Mr. Putin switched to French, and said something that sounded like “Injure”.
Mr. Gates’ translator whispered into his ear.
Mr. Gates whispered into my ear.
“One of these days–he said one of these days”, said Mr. Gates in my ear.
When the waiter came, to reinforce my point I ordered a capuccino with slivovitz and pirogi filled with grits.
I had to explain what grits were to the waiter.
Finally, it looked as if we were making progress explaining President Bush’s view of the world to the Russian leader….”
What Did You Do Today To Help To Destroy The American Empire? - Political Fever - The Political Debate Forums
April 7th, 2008 at 5:49 pm
[...] from seceding is absurd and disturbing. Mr. Speaker, NATO should be disbanded, not expanded. Antiwar.com Blog Ron Paul: Disband NATO __________________ Natalia Vitrenko, leader of the Progressive Socialist Party of Ukraine, burns [...]
Elaine Cullen
April 17th, 2008 at 10:09 am
The U.S. shouldn’t be doing any funding of NATO as the United States no longer has any decisionmaking power for NATO actions. In 1993, the United States was decommissioned from NATO and the decisionmaking power was shifted soley to the EU of which the United States is not a member. All of the decisions about these actions being taken by NATO are being made solely by the EU, yet involving both the use of US troops and massive expenditures of U.S. funding for military actions around the world. You can check out more at http://www.militarysetup.com
Sara
May 10th, 2008 at 5:12 pm
To Elaine Cullen.
I’ve read some of your writings, skimmed through some, and have an absolute knot in my solar plexus.
I did a search on you, and can’t find anything about you. Your reports are very damning and some of the scariest I’ve read – and I’ve read alot!
Please tell me how you’ve attained such in-depth knowledge.
Sincerely,
Sara