From Antiwar.com
...Their recklessness is epitomized by how the military budget came out in all the deficit dickering. As it stands, real defense cuts only kick in if the “super-Congress” fails to come to an agreement on what cuts to make. Then and only then will the misnamed “defense” department come in for something approximating its fair share of cuts. Put another way: only in the most extreme and politically next-to-impossible case will Congress even consider cutting back on its overseas empire. They’ll yank your grandmother off her dialysis machine before they’ll contemplate getting rid of “foreign aid.”...
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Showing posts with label military budget. Show all posts
Showing posts with label military budget. Show all posts
Sunday, August 7, 2011
Saturday, April 16, 2011
Monday, April 11, 2011
Jim Rogers: Dollar will be debased gold and silver to hit new highs
From India Info Line
Daily Bell: What about the wars America is prosecuting and its military stance generally? Affordable? Supportable?
Jim Rogers: Well it is certainly not affordable. America has got troops in over 100 countries and it is just making enemies and not helping America's standing in the world. As for supportable of course not! How can anybody justify America now getting involved in Libya? I mean if America is going to support opposition to everybody in the world we don't like, America is soon going to be totally bankrupt, even more bankrupt. Why are we supporting the guy in Yemen and not the guy in Libya? I can see absolutely no intellectual, philosophical, or even political justification for what we are doing.
Daily Bell: Can the US sustain the war in Afghanistan for another three years? Will it have success in Westernizing that country?
Jim Rogers: No, look at the size of Afghanistan; I don't think the guys in Washington have a clue how big it is. Sure, we can stay there for three years and spend huge amounts of money, human lives, and we are making our situation worse not better. So we can stay there, but it is only driving us further and further into problems.
Daily Bell: Is Pakistan being destabilized as a result?
Jim Rogers: It's been destabilized. We are making more and more enemies in Pakistan every day and this is giving more psychological support to the enemies. They have someone else to rail against, more reasons to rail against the US. Pakistan seems to be more and more unstable. They have nuclear weapons; they have a lot of people who don't like the US, and they have a lot of people who don't like India.
Pakistan is one of the ten largest countries in the world population wise, and it's in a very strategic area, I hope it's not going to happen; I hope they're not going to destabilize further, but this is how big wars start. People aren't worried, and then all of a sudden, everybody's in over their head.
Daily Bell: Some say the US is trying to surround China. Is there more military tension between the US and China these days? Is that a bad thing?
Jim Rogers: I don't know there's more military tension between China and the US these days. The US is in Pakistan, but the Pakistanis have been allies of the Chinese for a long time. If Pakistan is becoming more destabilized, then they are not going to be an ally of the US against China I assure you. No one in Pakistan is going to say, let's support the US against China.
Everybody knows the US is becoming weaker and weaker geo-politically and militarily. If Venezuela and Colombia went to war tomorrow, there's nothing the US could do. We're over-extended in every way. I think our real position is even weaker than it appears. We may be talking a good game, but China is developing on it's own, and since I don't see that they are doing anything that threatens the US militarily, I am perplexed with this question.
Politicians may be railing more and more about China, but that's a verbal encirclement of China, not a military one. China is the richest country in the world now and we are the largest debtors in the world. That accounts for verbal attacks. Pressuring China militarily won't change the equation.
Daily Bell: Where is gold headed? Silver?
Jim Rogers: Everything I have told the world about gold and silver is going to continue to happen. Eventually gold will be a couple of thousand dollars an ounce, and probably much higher, as currencies become more debased, who knows how high. Silver will definitely reach new highs. As I have said, the US dollar is in serious trouble, and will be debased a great deal in the future, and eventually will be problematical itself. So gold and silver will be measured by the US dollar but I hope there will still be some sound currencies no matter what happens.
Daily Bell: What about the wars America is prosecuting and its military stance generally? Affordable? Supportable?
Jim Rogers: Well it is certainly not affordable. America has got troops in over 100 countries and it is just making enemies and not helping America's standing in the world. As for supportable of course not! How can anybody justify America now getting involved in Libya? I mean if America is going to support opposition to everybody in the world we don't like, America is soon going to be totally bankrupt, even more bankrupt. Why are we supporting the guy in Yemen and not the guy in Libya? I can see absolutely no intellectual, philosophical, or even political justification for what we are doing.
Daily Bell: Can the US sustain the war in Afghanistan for another three years? Will it have success in Westernizing that country?
Jim Rogers: No, look at the size of Afghanistan; I don't think the guys in Washington have a clue how big it is. Sure, we can stay there for three years and spend huge amounts of money, human lives, and we are making our situation worse not better. So we can stay there, but it is only driving us further and further into problems.
Daily Bell: Is Pakistan being destabilized as a result?
Jim Rogers: It's been destabilized. We are making more and more enemies in Pakistan every day and this is giving more psychological support to the enemies. They have someone else to rail against, more reasons to rail against the US. Pakistan seems to be more and more unstable. They have nuclear weapons; they have a lot of people who don't like the US, and they have a lot of people who don't like India.
Pakistan is one of the ten largest countries in the world population wise, and it's in a very strategic area, I hope it's not going to happen; I hope they're not going to destabilize further, but this is how big wars start. People aren't worried, and then all of a sudden, everybody's in over their head.
Daily Bell: Some say the US is trying to surround China. Is there more military tension between the US and China these days? Is that a bad thing?
Jim Rogers: I don't know there's more military tension between China and the US these days. The US is in Pakistan, but the Pakistanis have been allies of the Chinese for a long time. If Pakistan is becoming more destabilized, then they are not going to be an ally of the US against China I assure you. No one in Pakistan is going to say, let's support the US against China.
Everybody knows the US is becoming weaker and weaker geo-politically and militarily. If Venezuela and Colombia went to war tomorrow, there's nothing the US could do. We're over-extended in every way. I think our real position is even weaker than it appears. We may be talking a good game, but China is developing on it's own, and since I don't see that they are doing anything that threatens the US militarily, I am perplexed with this question.
Politicians may be railing more and more about China, but that's a verbal encirclement of China, not a military one. China is the richest country in the world now and we are the largest debtors in the world. That accounts for verbal attacks. Pressuring China militarily won't change the equation.
Daily Bell: Where is gold headed? Silver?
Jim Rogers: Everything I have told the world about gold and silver is going to continue to happen. Eventually gold will be a couple of thousand dollars an ounce, and probably much higher, as currencies become more debased, who knows how high. Silver will definitely reach new highs. As I have said, the US dollar is in serious trouble, and will be debased a great deal in the future, and eventually will be problematical itself. So gold and silver will be measured by the US dollar but I hope there will still be some sound currencies no matter what happens.
Sunday, November 14, 2010
US defense spending bringing down an empire
From RT.
With US debt skyrocketing to $13.5 trillion, the rallying cry from Washington is to cut spending. But many politicians refuse to address defense spending.
Defense spending accounts for 58 percent of the discretionary pie, more than a trillion dollars a year all-in, or almost half of what the entire rest of the world spends combined.
With the US relying on countries like China to fund its wars and military bases around the world, even members of the Washington establishment are saying the US is bringing on its own demise as an imperial power through excessive spending it can no longer afford.
With US debt skyrocketing to $13.5 trillion, the rallying cry from Washington is to cut spending. But many politicians refuse to address defense spending.
Defense spending accounts for 58 percent of the discretionary pie, more than a trillion dollars a year all-in, or almost half of what the entire rest of the world spends combined.
With the US relying on countries like China to fund its wars and military bases around the world, even members of the Washington establishment are saying the US is bringing on its own demise as an imperial power through excessive spending it can no longer afford.
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