Vijay Mehta | Presentation online meeting Uniting for Peace
On July 20, Vijay Mehta gave a presentation at the online conference “Escalating War in Europe Could Lead to WWIII – Can the Peace Movement Hold US/NATO, UK, Russia, Ukraine Accountable?” Below is the text of his presentation:
“Goedenavond en welkom bij de bijeenkomst van vandaag. Mijn naam is Vijay Mehta, voorzitter van Uniting for Peace, bestuurslid van GAMIP (Global Alliance for Ministries and Infrastructure for Peace) en auteur van How Not To Go To War. Als een van de afgevaardigden een exemplaar van mijn boek wil hebben, zal ik het met alle plezier gratis naar hem/haar opsturen. Stuur mij een e-mail met uw naam en adres. (Vijay Mehta – vijay@vmpeace.org)
Let me say a few words about our organization, Uniting for Peace. Uniting for Peace, active for over 43 years – since 1979, is a non-profit organization dedicated to creating and promoting a global culture of peace, nonviolent alternatives to ending war, poverty reduction and sustainable development. One of its core objectives is to establish Ministries and Departments for Peace by lobbying and influencing parliamentarians and legislators to abolish war, militarism and the arms trade, including nuclear and conventional weapons. The savings achieved through the reduction of armaments should be used to promote a culture of peace and nonviolence.
Dear friends, I am going to start my presentation on the escalating war in Europe. The invasion of Ukraine by Russia must be condemned in the strongest terms, because there is no such thing as a good or just war. It brings bloodshed and suffering to the innocent people of Ukraine. The United Kingdom is complicit in the war because it supplies weapons and intelligence to Ukraine to continue the war.
The RAND Corporation think tank outlines plans for the US to “balkanize” the Russian Federation, neutralize Moscow, and encircle China. When one thinks of starting World War III, one could not think of a better idea. The planned expansion of NATO to the east and the acceptance of Finland and Sweden as NATO members proves that NATO is a grand military pact of expansionism and that all the promises the West made to Russia not to expand eastward were lies.
NATO announced at the Madrid Conference (June 2022) that it will increase its defense from the current 40,000 to 300,000 troops to prevent Russia from invading other countries, and to prevent China from invading Taiwan. The increase in the arms budget and the sending of troops by NATO countries can only escalate the war and the loss of human lives. It makes NATO the most dangerous military alliance on the planet.
Dear friends, the Ukraine conflict is a propaganda war aimed at weakening Russia and China. In their quest for hegemony and control of their dwindling power and crumbling empire, the US sees them as enemies. It is a US hero-villain story for a call to arms rhetoric that divides the world into different categories to generate public support for military action and the sale of weapons.
There is a big difference between the US resource wars in Iraq, Afghanistan, Syria, etc. and the current war between Russia and Ukraine. There was hardly any opposition in the Middle Eastern countries and the US military was able to gain the upper hand in all those situations by occupying foreign territory. The difference with the war between Russia and Ukraine is that Russia is a nuclear armed country with enormous firepower that is difficult, if not impossible, to defeat. There is now a proxy war going on between NATO (US and its allies) and Russia, and a frontal war between Ukraine and Russia.
NATO’s main goal is to prolong the war and weaken Russia by providing Ukraine with money, troops and military equipment; a perfect scenario for a regional war in Europe to escalate into World War III, perhaps with devastating consequences if nuclear weapons are used. The longer the war continues, the more likely it is that a line will be crossed into a full-scale war between Russia and the United States.
Europe's peace project turns into a war project
After 75 years of relative peace and seven decades of European integration driven by the pursuit of peace in Europe, we are in the middle of a war that shows no signs of ending anytime soon. The pursuit of peace has given way to a war project with EU member states and the US sending heavy weapons to Ukraine to continue the war. The EU is also considering a nuclear option; a frightening scenario.
There are many explanations for the fact that Europe's peace project has turned into a war project. NATO's expansion to the east is the source of the conflict between Russia and the West. The Russians feel betrayed and fear encirclement. NATO has been a serious threat to world peace since its creation in 1949 and has left a trail of destruction from Libya, Yugoslavia to Afghanistan. NATO is a war alliance that is part of the US military-industrial complex, which fuels global conflicts for the benefit of arms manufacturers and war profiteers. We must dismantle war and disband NATO, just as the Warsaw Pact was disbanded.
Why Asia, Africa and the Middle East are not supporting the West's war
Dear friends, unlike the COVID situation when most of the countries of the world were working together and aligned, the countries of Asia, Africa and the Middle East are not supporting the Western war and their propaganda against Russia. They have refused to impose sanctions on Russia and are trading with Russia as before. They see the apparent hypocrisy and double standards at play as the Western countries behave differently by supporting the war in Ukraine while turning a blind eye to the wars/conflicts in Palestine, Syria, Iraq and Venezuela, and they do not condemn the US war aggression and its dictatorial policies of regime change in Latin America.
Let us not forget that we live in a free, independent society thanks in part to the sacrifices made by the Russians during World War II. It would be wise to stop the military reactions and agree to a ceasefire and normalization of relations between Russia, Ukraine and the West. Otherwise, the continuation of the war will have devastating consequences and could lead to nuclear options or World War III. Therefore, the only way to deal with the conflict in Ukraine is a dialogue using peaceful means to resolve the conflict.
Solutions
Dear friends, sooner or later the war will end and Russian forces will retreat to Russia and there will be peace between Russia and Ukraine. It is foolishness for the US and the West to think that by supplying Ukraine with weapons the West can force Russia into submission. Trying to win or humiliate a country as large as Russia by force or weapons is not only dangerous but also misguided. It is up to all of us in the peace movement to formulate strategies to prevent further escalation. Painting Russia as evil and dehumanizing is counterproductive.
The destruction, killing and suffering of World War II, which killed over 85 million people, is recent history, not a distant memory. Under no circumstances should there be a Third World War; there has been enough bloodshed in Ukraine.
Dear friends, we cannot achieve peace by supplying heavy weapons, because this increases the risk of World War III. Rearmament by countries is harmful to their own populations, because it means less investment in health, education and jobs. Increasing military expenditure cannot be justified; we are in the midst of a fuel crisis and there is hunger all over the world, as the current food crisis shows.
My 2019 book How Not To Go To War proposes an alternative and radical solution to end war, namely the establishment of peace ministries/departments and peace centers in all countries of the world, with the mandate to promote a culture of peace and nonviolent solutions to domestic and international conflicts by exposing the underlying causes of violence in society and offering alternative peace strategies. In the long term, the peace movement should strive for the dissolution of NATO and its replacement by a collective security system based on dialogue, diplomacy, disarmament and cooperation. There can be no peace in Europe if Russia is not part of the international community.
Dear friends, we must work to end this war and this culture of militarism. It is astonishing that not once has there been a ceasefire or negotiations. What we need today is the creation of departments/ministries for Peace that will institutionalize peace in the same way that war has been institutionalized by the Ministry of Defense.
As John F. Kennedy said in his 1961 address to the United Nations: “Mankind must end war or war will end mankind.”
