This 2025 edition, with a new forward for the Trump era, updates earlier editions describing the crisis of war in eastern Europe (Ukraine and Russia), West Asia (Israel, Palestine, and their neighbors), and East Asia. It is an effort to identify the causes and sort truth from propaganda. It examines the role of the Big Lie in developing public consent and blunting popular opposition, and describes ways countries around the world as well as the general public are pressing for peace.
The world is in a crisis now. The danger of nuclear disaster and global war is greater than ever. The main reason is not China or Russia. It’s the determination of “neocons” in Washington to maintain US global domination. This mania is causing economic hardship in Europe and everywhere. The "justification" for all this is based on lies.
“With the escalating genocide in Palestine, New Cold War on China, and its proxy war against Russia, the US ruling class, motivated by their mission of hegemony, are pushing humanity towards World War 3. Dee Knight provides a passionate plea for peace, and a call for bold action against imperialism. Essential reading.”
— Carlos Martinez, Co-founder, Friends of Socialist China
A year after the first peace proposal to end the Ukraine-Russia conflict was agreed in principle by both sides, peace is no closer. Britain’s then-prime minister Boris Johnson flew to Kyiv to scuttle that deal. He told Ukraine’s President Zelensky the “collective West” was “in it for the long run,” and “wanted no part in any agreement between Ukraine and Russia.”
Even before the leaders of Russia and Ukraine came to that first peace agreement, Joe Biden said on March 26, 2022 that “this battle will not be won in days or months, either. We need to steel ourselves for the long fight ahead.”
In a June 1, 2022 op-ed statement in the New York Times, Biden said “I will not pressure the Ukrainian government – in private or public – to make any territorial concessions.” He did not say if the U.S. would exert pressure against such concessions, which would surely be required for talks to start. Ukrainian President Zelensky insisted that Russian troops must leave all the areas they have occupied. Neither the Russian government nor the people of the Donbas, Crimea and nearby areas can be expected to give up the gains achieved in the war.
China’s top diplomat, State Counselor Wang Yi, told the delegates at the Munich Security Conference in February 2023 “it is imperative to return to the Minsk II agreement… as quickly as possible.” That would mean a ceasefire and autonomy for the Donbas, and getting NATO out of Ukraine. Wang said Minsk II “is a binding instrument negotiated by the parties concerned and endorsed by the UN Security Council.” He said “Russia and the EU both support Minsk II,” and claimed U.S. Secretary of State Blinken had expressed U.S. support. He called for “the relevant parties [to] sit down together” to work out a roadmap and timetable for implementation of the agreement. He then announced China’s 12-point plan for peace in Ukraine. It calls for “abandoning the Cold War mentality” and bloc confrontation. It insists world leaders “work together for peace and stability” and “help parties to the conflict open the door to a political settlement as soon as possible.” It says “Nuclear proliferation must be prevented and nuclear crisis avoided,” and “opposes unilateral sanctions unauthorized by the UN Security Council.”
Joe Biden said “I’ve seen nothing in the plan that would… be beneficial to anyone other than Russia if the Chinese plan were followed.” Ukraine’s President Zelensky said he was “willing to consider aspects” of the Chinese proposal. China is Ukraine’s largest trading partner.
Following President Xi’s historic March 2023 visit to Moscow, Russian President Putin said “many of the provisions of the peace plan put forward by China are consonant with Russian approaches and can be taken as the basis for a peaceful settlement when the West and Kiev are ready for it.” He added that while he and Xi “were discussing the possibility of implementing the Chinese peace plan,” the UK announced it “would supply not only tanks to Ukraine, but also depleted uranium shells.”
In Washington, DC, on March 18, 2023, several thousand people participated in a rally, march and teach-in on the 20th anniversary of the U.S. invasion and occupation of Iraq. The demonstration called for “an end to the U.S./NATO proxy war in Ukraine, which is the center of world politics today, and is ushering in a new era where the United States, the main imperialist power in the world, is seeing its economic, political and military hegemony being eroded as other alliances are taking shape to challenge the U.S. This, however, is creating a dangerous situation where major nuclear powers are facing off against each other as the U.S. and its NATO allies continually pump more weapons, money and mercenaries into Ukraine.”
Much larger protests have taken place across Europe, where several governments have collapsed under the “boomerang effect” of sanctions on Russia. Countries in the Global South, led by the BRICS grouping of Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa, have refused to go along with the sanctions, and the U.S. “dollar domination” of world trade is under severe stress. Financial crisis and economic recessions or depressions threaten countries across the globe, including the U.S. These developments are harbingers of a new era dawning, in which there may be realistic possibilities for an end to global conflict.
Most of the essays that form the chapters of this book were written “in the heat of events.” They were meant to answer – and refute – the official narrative of the U.S. government and mainstream media.
Is The US War Machine Stoppable? This introductory essay calls for reviving an antiwar movement on a new basis, adequate to the new circumstances, but inspired by the legacy of the Reverend Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., and by the recent upsurge of protests in Europe.
Shock and Awe: Then and Now compares the U.S. wars in Iraq and Afghanistan with official hysterical and self-righteous condemnation of Russian actions in the current conflict. It examines the impact of U.S. and European sanctions on the global economy, and details Russian offers of ceasefire and peace talks, a possible role for China, and the state of the U.S. antiwar movement.
Joe Biden’s Saber-Rattling Threatens WWIII with China and Russia. Threats by the U.S. against China over Taiwan are the first focus of this essay, followed by a review of official U.S. justifications for war against Vietnam, Iraq, Libya, Syria, Yugoslavia, and Korea. “What America will and will not do in Ukraine” is examined in testimony from Scott Ritter, former UN weapons inspector. This includes Ritter’s defense of Russia’s special military operation, with support from Ellen Taylor, daughter of Nuremberg War Crimes Tribunal prosecutor Telford Taylor.
Buildup to Open War: Threats and Counter-threats Over Ukraine – What’s It About and Who’s to Blame? This January 2022 article analyzes the prelude to the outbreak of conflict in Ukraine. It traces the enlargement of NATO from its original twelve members to 30-plus today, and examines the intensification of the Ukrainian civil war against the separatist Donbas provinces. It details the summer 2021 NATO exercises from the Baltic Sea to the Black Sea involving 30,000 U.S. troops, simulated bombing raids near Russian airspace, and thousands of NATO “instructors” in Ukraine. It reviews the rise of fascist gangs in Ukraine, and summarizes the Minsk II peace deal, which was adopted by France, Germany, Russia and Ukraine in 2015, and endorsed unanimously by the UN Security Council. It also looks at the issue of the Nord Stream 2 gas pipeline, Europe’s need for energy security, and desire to remain neutral in any U.S. war against Russia or China.
War Threats Add to Climate Change Danger… examines the global debate about the danger of climate change, adding information about the role of the U.S. military in global emissions, suggesting a simple solution: ground the bombers and save the planet. It includes a review of U.S. threats against China.
‘This Battle Will Not Be Won in Days or Months’ looks at the impact of Biden’s March 26, 2022 declaration that Vladimir Putin “cannot remain in power.” It provides details about Washington’s and Ukraine’s PR war, and examines the “new round of peace talks” in late March 2022, after the Russian military announced that “the main tasks of the first stage of [its] special military operation had been completed.” Commentary is included from economist Michael Hudson, political scientist John Mearsheimer, a South African ANC Youth League leader, Ajamu Baraka of Black Agenda Report, Brown University’s Costs of War Project, and CodePink.
Showdown at ‘Credibility Gulch’ in Ukraine War examines credibility issues in the official U.S. government war narrative. It presents Scott Ritter’s history of Ukraine’s fascist movement with official and semi-official U.S. government support, and the testimony of former NATO military analyst Jacques Baud about neo-Nazi forces in Ukraine, plus Ritter’s commentary on the war crimes issue. Ex-CIA Director Michael Pompeo’s admission about U.S. lying is included, along with former National Security Adviser Zbigniew Brzezinski’s “Grand Chessboard” strategy to partition Russia, and the role of State Department operative Victoria Nuland. The conclusion is that “public opinion in the U.S. and Europe will eventually turn against the official Big Lie.”
Anti-Russian Propaganda Limits Peace Prospects discusses the challenges to both continued war and possibilities for peace. It describes the surge of anti-NATO protest at the June 2022 NATO summit in Madrid, as well as the “confusion of the American people” which has often neglected the sources of the conflict and instead echoed the neocons in Washington and the main-stream media. The refusal of countries outside Europe to go along with sanctions is explained, along with Russia’s successful efforts to “normalize” its economic situation. The U.S. goal to dismember Russia is examined in some detail. An alternative basis for peace is presented, reflecting Ukraine’s ethnic composition. The statement for peace of the Internationalist Anti-Imperialist Front, at the Madrid Peace Summit in June 2022 is presented. Also included is Michael Pompeo’s declaration that the U.S. must remain “the dominant force in the world… for an awfully long time to come.”
‘A Real Path to Peace’ – A Movement is Launched describes a November 2022 rally at People’s Forum in New York, involving an array of leading anti-war groups and leaders.
We Won’t Be Silent Anymore! is a report from a massive and militant Poor People’s Moral March and rally in Washington, DC in June 2022.
Pivot To Peace! describes the emergence of a coalition of Asian-Americans and other peace forces protesting the intensifying U.S. threats against China, and accompanying anti-Asian violence in this country. The essay provides a brief historical overview of Taiwan’s long history as part of China. The article also summarizes protests in east Asia against U.S. bases there, as well as strikes and protests in Europe and the United States.
Does China’s Rise Really Threaten the U.S.? This essay says “fake news” is brainwashing the U.S. public into accepting a new Cold War with China – with bills to counter China’s Belt and Road Initiative, and to punish China for alleged human rights violations. It details the U.S. “pivot to Asia” with aircraft carriers and nuclear subs, missiles and super-bombers aimed at China, with tens of thousands of troops, and new aggressive alliances. The article cites polls showing people don’t want war, and more people see the U.S. as a threat to democracy than either China or Russia. It summarizes a Harvard study finding more than 90% of the Chinese people like their government. It quotes Bernie Sanders commenting about “relentless fearmongering about China,” and an increase in anti-Asian hate crimes. Mainstream media’s demonization of China is examined, in terms first of Hong Kong, then Xinjiang and Taiwan. There is a section comparing U.S. and Chinese activity in Africa, challenging the “debt trap” myth and detailing Chinese investment in, and trade with Africa, as well as the growth and nature of China’s global foreign aid volume and policy.
‘Democracy and Human Rights’: China vs. USA starts with a face-off at the UN between the USA and China over peace, democracy and human values. It cites China’s leader Xi Jinping, that “Democracy is not a special right reserved for any individual country but a right for the people of all countries to enjoy.” It compares U.S. difficulties prying money away from the military-industrial complex to deal with people’s needs and saving the planet, with China’s recent success in helping 800 million people lift themselves out of extreme poverty. It details China’s economic success, with average wages there doubling between 2010 and 2020. There is also a description of how Chinese democratic institutions work, as well as China’s response to the COVID19 pandemic.
‘Yankees Go Home!’ Asians Say describes a recent surge of protests against U.S. military bases in Okinawa and South Korea. The article includes an explanation that “the U.S. state of permanent war in Asia and the Pacific today is… the inevitable product of a centuries-long project of U.S. hegemony in the Pacific.”
Biden Travels East in Clouds of Mistrust describes Biden’s embarrassing visits to the November 2022 G20 conference in Indonesia, the East Asia Summit in Cambodia, and the COP27 Climate Change conference in Egypt. In each case he “exhorted other nations to follow America’s lead,” with his message falling flat in the face of calls for “loss and damage” funds for climate change, peace in Ukraine, and opposition to sanctions.
‘With Us or Against Us’ Fails in Munich and Bangalore tells of Mafia style pressure on Global South leaders by U.S. diplomats at the 2023 G20 summit in India, where French President Macron said he “was struck by how much we are losing the trust of the Global South.” Chinese top diplomat Wang Yi’s intervention at the Munich Security Summit highlights China’s 12-point plan for peace in Ukraine, and its Global Security Initiative Concept paper, as well as its detailed denunciation of “U.S. Hegemony and Its Perils.” The chapter includes the story of “twin speeches” by the U.S. and Russian presidents a year after the start of Russia’s Special Military Operation, as well as reports that “it’s still uncertain that a united West won’t blink first.” The chapter ends with coverage of the first major national antiwar mobilization, May 18, 2023, in Washington, DC, as well as much larger protests in Europe.
Dr. Strangelove Is No Longer Satire tells of the intensifying danger of nuclear war, inspiring economist Jeffrey Sachs to declare January 25 “We are at the brink of a disaster… first and foremost because of the United States which is a major provocateur of this war, and a major threat to peace.” A German Left Party leader says sending tanks to Ukraine “is obviously about passing Germany the poisoned chalice. Berlin is to be sent into the line of fire, to conclusively destroy German-Russian relations and turn them into open war for others’ benefit.” It explains how the September 26 explosion of the Nord Stream pipelines can be seen as a guarantee, for now, that Europe cannot depend on Russian gas. It describes the sober assessment of the Pentagon’s main think tank about the war, along with a description of “the insanity of planning for a nuclear war,” and, finally, a summary of the Russian peace proposal of December 2021.
Why It’s So Hard to Stop the U.S. War Machine is a review of two important books: American Exception: Empire and the Deep State, by Aaron Good, and American Exceptionalism and American Innocence: A People’s History of Fake News, by Robert Sirvent and Danny Haiphong. It explains that American exception and exceptionalism are different: the first is a “state of exception,” when a government suspends normal laws and governs by decree; the other is justification for power mongering and conquest, based on the myth that whatever the U.S. does is “for the good of all, no matter how bad it may seem.” The chapter summarizes the authors’ deep digging for details, including CIA-backed coups, assassinations and slaughters across the globe. It also shows how all this is hard-wired into the “deep state,” driven by Wall Street and Big Oil, and supported by the mainstream media. It ends offering solutions, intended “to be a tool to help rebuild the U.S. antiwar movement.”
Empire’s Neoliberal Debt Trap: How to Resist Gluttonous Greed is a review of economist Michael Hudson’s book, The Destiny of Civilization: Finance Capitalism, Industrial Capitalism or Socialism. It provides a systemic explanation of “how the U.S./NATO confrontation with Russia in Ukraine is achieving just the opposite of preventing China, Russia and their allies from acting independently of U.S. control…” It also provides a basic explanation of neoliberalism and how it works to empty the pockets of the poor into the bank accounts of the rich, and twist “democracy” to ensure corporate control. It predicts that a depression is coming, while the Biden administration’s sanctions are used as an excuse to charge monopoly prices, and “the entire blame for inflation is placed on wage earners.” The essay ends with a “set of keys China has used to ‘avoid the American financial disease’,” and a prediction that “an end to Dollar Dominance in the world foreshadows a general disintegration of capitalism’s last great empire.”
Neoliberalism Has Been Far from ‘Liberal’ is a review of The Rise and Fall of Neoliberal Capitalism, by economist David M. Kotz. It serves as a primer on how neoliberalism works – slashing taxes for the rich, deregulating industry and the banks, gutting environmental, consumer and workplace safety rules, emphasizing globalization, and reconstituting democracy into oligarchy. It shows how the “Reagan revolution” gutted the Keynesian system that prevailed from FDR’s time to the stagflation of the 1970s. It also shows how Pinochet’s Chile was neoliberalism’s first laboratory, and how the “pink tide” of anti-neoliberalism swept Latin America in the first decade of this century, and was then reversed by CIA-backed coups, “lawfare” and other interventions. It also explains how the U.S. war on Iraq and the global financial crisis of 2008 made a return of the pink tide possible. The chapter ends with a summary of possibilities for a post-neoliberal world.
Sanctions: A Wrecking Ball in a Global Economy shows how these illegal unilateral measures of economic coercion have become a preferred imperialist tactic against countries that stray from the fold. It details how sanctions are imposed on more than forty countries, but how they also have become a boomerang that is devastating Europe, and how the main U.S. targets of sanctions are leading the world in breaking free from U.S. domination.
Dissenting Soldiers Challenge the War Machine relates the experience of soldiers who have spoken out based on their experience in the “forever wars.”
Desertion in the Time of Vietnam describes how resistance changed the lives of tens of thousands of young Americans during the U.S. war in Vietnam.
The Socialist Antiwar Tradition: Leading the Fight Against War and Imperialism explains the special role of socialists in opposing U.S. wars, from the heroism of Eugene Debs and the Green Corn Rebellion led by the Socialist Party and the Industrial Workers of the World (IWW) in 1917, to the alliance of SDS and the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC) that led to the massive movement against the U.S. war in Vietnam. It also details the roles of the Black Panther Party, as well as the GI resistance, both in the combat zone and stateside, and the contribution of antiwar combat veterans. It shows how the antiwar movement became anti-imperialist in response to U.S. interventions in Central America, and support for colonial oppression in Palestine and Africa, and how the movement resurged with ever larger mass protests against the U.S. war on Iraq. It concludes that “the obvious lesson is that peace and social transformation go together: we can’t have one without the other.”
Looking Back on the Violent Sixties & Seventies relates the story of the Weather Underground, which emerged from SDS in response to racist violence in the U.S. south, and the U.S. war in Vietnam. With fake ID and fake names they transformed themselves from middle- and upper-class children of privilege into ordinary workers. They sustained uncompromising solidarity with the Black Panthers, mobilizing both underground and in the streets in their defense and in protest against the illegal U.S. aggression in Vietnam and Cambodia.
Calls for Unconditional Amnesty for Military Resisters… is a brief report of ongoing support for U.S. military resisters during the “endless wars” in Iraq and Afghanistan. It provides a summary of the meaning of amnesty as ending punishment for civilian and military actions of resistance to unjust wars.
Pentagon Downplays GI Suicides tells of the 20 veterans a day who have died of suicide from 1979 to 2014, and how Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder afflicts nearly half a million veterans of the Iraq and Afghanistan wars. It quotes advice from the Marine Corps: “don’t force them or pressure them to do something they don’t feel comfortable doing.”
How Will This End and What’s Next? This concluding essay says the neocons in Washington are gambling big-time with their proxy war against Russia, and their escalating threats against China. It asks: what if they lose? It cites Michael Hudson, saying “The U.S./NATO confrontation with Russia is achieving just the opposite of America’s aim of preventing China, Russia and their allies from acting independently of U.S. control…” It explains the acceleration of “De-Dollarization,” so the U.S. economic grip on the world is likely to diminish fairly fast. It explores possibilities for a “post-U.S. imperial-ism” world, and cites an interview with Black Agenda for Peace leader Ajamu Baraka, calling for an intensified, united movement against imperialism and fascism. “The most immediate thing,” he said, “is to deal with the ongoing war in Ukraine because of the threat it represents to the species. We need to revive the antiwar movement, and demand that the resources transferred from people’s needs to the military must cease.” It also cites Radhika Desai’s suggestion that “the Ukraine conflict promises to constitute a major turning point.” It concludes that “the bottom line is the U.S. will no longer be able to control the world. As its empire collapses new possibilities will emerge across the globe and here at home.”
An “afterword” concludes that people in the United States and western Europe could have a better life if we can stop the U.S./NATO war machine. That would take the world back from the threat of nuclear war. And it could lead to true prosperity everywhere. But we have to fight for it. We need to stop business as usual and refocus the country on peace and justice – redirect the war economy to meet people’s needs; stop building weapons and invest in a liveable future, based on social equality and common prosperity. It can happen if we really try.