| By Victor Perio Tre Most important political-military Action of President Carter has been his Adoption of the Ford military budget. It ‘ances a sinister acceleration of the hitnerace, Which began two years ago "ith the first budget submiited by Pres- ent Ford to Congress early in 1975 for Me fiscal year 1976. The military budget 9 how projected through fiscal year 982 when it is to reach $167.1 billion, as *Ompared with $91.9. billion in fiscal v7: an increase of 82% in seven years. here has never been sucha military huildup in peacetime. There has never c anything close to such a military uildup without its erupting into war. _ Such a rate of increase is not only und to be inflationary, it will also /*ve other significant economic effects, ee of them harmful. to U.S. working _ ople. |. While President Carter’s trivial re- |Slons concern only fiscal year 1978, he “8 In fact adopted the whole long-run *tspective of an accelerated arms #Ce. Excusing the limited revisions to ® Said he would reflect his own views *8inning with the 1978 budget. But his aget revision document says: | “The preliminary assessment is that 2€ currently planned force structure is eds, but that the efficiency of our ees consistent with our defense © ilitary programs can be improved.” __Inshort, there is to be no fundamen- - I al change. | Insight into the aggressive essence Tovided by the ‘‘Military Posture’’ jatement sent to Congress by General orge S. Brown, chairman of the Joint hiefs of Staff, in support of that budget, r Carter’s inauguration. |, He said, ‘‘. . the aim of the Joint *lefs of Staff is to ensure that the na- n’s territory remains secure, that its ational interests are protected, and Aat freedom of action in the world is not Sridged by threat or use of hostile Ailitary force,” _ The emphasis is mine, but so in fact } it General Brown’s. Aside from the Teference to defense of the territory of € United States throughout the 123- ®ge document. He focuses entirely on feparation to project U.S. military Wer everywhere else and, as we shall » his concept of “national interests” {£Xclusively that of Exxon, IBM, and oO >: Military, but is devoid of real con- - It vanishes whenever the general *Scusses Soviet policies concretely. Dntir, Soviet Union, says Brown, will itinue “avoiding direct military con- (ntation” and will not “be prone to ht -.oKe actions entailing a signific- waisk of war.” pngonsider the situation in Europe, ti € there is the most direct confron- tween NATO and Warsaw Pact 1 ae and where the main overseas 1 ea United States — and 8,000 far vuclear weapons — are concen- Se Says Brown: ‘A Warsaw Pact bt tha to initiate war against NATO is dup. Usht likely in the near term.” = 6 We must be particularly concerned € 1978 budget because of lack of time, - | the Ford-Carter military budget is - ve-quoted mention, there is scarcely . with the reality of our strength in Europe as well as the way we are per- ceived by our potential adversary. We must not only be strong; we must en- sure that our actions make manifest our strength to the Soviet Union and its Warsaw Pact allies.” This is nothing short of a policy of bullying, bluster, provocation and threat. And he admits that the Warsaw Pact proposals for Mutual Balanced Force Reductions in Europe call for 15% cuts across the board to “‘maintain the present correlation of forces.” But he upholds the NATO-U.S. demand that the USSR reduce its forces while NATO. continues its military buildup, so as to change the balance of forces in NATO’s favor: ‘The overriding objective for NATO is to strengthen its military posture by making the quantitative and qualitative ~ improvements in conventional forces needed. . .” In the. General’s posture statement there is none of the Carter rhetoric about protecting human rights. The ob- jectives of U.S. imperialism are set forth in classic terms: Asia, Africa, and Latin America are looked on exclu- sively as sources of raw materials to be monopolized by the United States. and its NATO allies. The Atlantic is claimed as a U.S. lake in which the Soviet Union ‘s to be “‘contained’’ and “‘interdicted.” And everywhere, the Soviet ‘“‘menace”’ turns out to be assistance 50 © developingin economic development and in liberation from colonialism. ‘In the Middle East: ‘Continued ac-_ cess to Middle East oil at manageable prices for our NATO allies, Japan, and the United States must remain an im- portant U.S. objective in the region for the foreseeable future.’’ He makes clear that the United States would not. hesitate to invade Middle Eastern coun- tries if they should charge prices that the imperialists deem ‘‘unmanage- able,”’ or if they decide to sell their oil to somebody else. Thus, while he cannot find anything practical to charge the USSR with in this area, he complains that ‘“The USSR is seeking to increase economic ties, as manifested by a recent trade agree- ment with Iran.” Is it. to counter this that U.S. im- perialism is sending tens of billions of dollars worth of weapons and tens. of thousands of servicemen to the region, establishing new bases in. the Persian Gulf and Indian Ocean, and providing massive CIA bribes to its political pup- pets? For Africa, the emphasis is on Southern Africa, which provides the main supplies of “‘six of the most essen- ~ tial commodities required by modern technological societies’? and a route around. the Cape for supertankers car- rying oil from the Middle East. He stresses that Africa is increasing in im- portance as a supplier of raw materials to the United States and its allies. What here is the Soviet menace? That the-suffering imposed by im- perialism, colonialism, and apartheid “‘provide opportunities for Communist nations to become involved in ways that threaten the interests of the United States and the West.” Brown boasts that the United States has bases in Liberia, Zaire, Ethiopia, Tunisia, Kenya and Morocco; that U.S. armament firms are replacing British and French as the main supplier of weapons to Africa; and that African military personnel are being trained in -the United States... ..‘‘the... .personal contact inherent in these programs provides long term benefits. . .” Yes, how many African Pinochets are the imperialists hoping to place in key posi- tions! But this isn’t enough. Brown states that the United States is striving to get more military bases in Africa on the ex- cuse that the USSR might intercept U.S. oil tankers going around the continent! In South Asia and the Indian Ocean, Brown finds ‘‘arrangements for facilities for the Soviet fishing fleet”’ - and ‘‘extensive maritime commerce’”’ as excuses for the new aggressive U.S. base on Diego Garcia, being built up in defiance of strenuous protests from al- most all states bordering on the Indian Ocean, not to speak of the displaced in- habitants of the island. In Latin America, again, the exclu- sive concern is with U.S. domination of the continent as a source of raw mate- rials. He worries about Latin American countries striving to develop indust- rially. which might lead to their con- ducting ‘‘their affairs in accordance with their own changing perceptions of their national interests.’’ When this happens, ‘‘we can. . .reasonably expect occasional confrontations with them.” Out with the “‘big stick’’! And get this: “Soviet and Cuban influence, detri- mental to U.S. security interests, con- tinues insidiously in Latin America and the Caribbean. . .in the form of techni- cal assistance, economic educaton, cul- tural cooperation and friendship societies.” These are the objectives for which we are asked to finance the most ag- gressive military buildup in history. _And that is the ‘‘menace’’ which stands in the way of these objectives. “PACIFIC TRIBUNE-MARCH 285, 1977—Page 7