On Thursday night, President Joe Biden — acting without congressional approval — ordered airstrikes on Houthi targets in Yemen, an escalation in the regional spillover from Israel’s war in Gaza that now directly involves US military personnel.
Biden chose to escalate the conflict and bomb Yemen in response to Houthi fighters' Red Sea attacks. His unconditional support and steady flow of weapons to Israel appears to be increasing the likelihood of a regional war. Instead of using the U.S.’s considerable leverage over Israel to push for a ceasefire, Biden is enabling a brutal war that has killed more than 23,000 Palestinians, and ties his administration to Israel’s decisions as it inches toward an all out war with Hezbollah in Lebanon.
Biden should be honest with Americans: the longer Israel's siege of Gaza persists, the greater the chances of a regional conflagration that will put American lives in danger.
Eli Clifton is a senior advisor at the Quincy Institute and Investigative Journalist at Large at Responsible Statecraft. He reports on money in politics and U.S. foreign policy.
Khody Akhavi is Senior Video Producer at the Quincy Institute. Previously he was Head of Video for Al-Monitor and covered the White House for Al Jazeera English, as well as produced films for the network’s flagship investigative unit.
President of United States Joe Biden (L) and President of China Xi Jinping attend a working lunch during APEC (Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation) in San Francisco, California, United States on November 16, 2023.( The Yomiuri Shimbun ) VIA REUTERS
A group of nearly five dozen progressive American and Japanese lawmakers are calling on President Biden to employ a “robust diplomatic approach” to ease tensions between the U.S. and Taiwan and China, and to avoid what they view as increasing potential for conflict in the Taiwan Strait.
“A potential conflict would be disastrous, and we remain concerned that the possibility remains unacceptably high,” the lawmakers said in a letter to the president on Friday. “Hostilities would produce grave harm to the physical, economic, and social well-being of the people of the United States and Japan, the people of Taiwan and China, and the most vulnerable and disadvantaged people across the world.”
The lawmakers’ letter, led by the Congressional Progressive Caucus in the U.S. and the Progressive Caucus Japan in that country’s Diet, comes as Beijing has increasingly asserted its military prowess around Taiwan, with China’s President Xi Jinping restating the importance of reunifying Taiwan with the Chinese mainland. Meanwhile, Taiwan’s new president, Lai Ching-te, who has in the past been a fierce proponent of Taiwan’s independence, has since moderated his views, voicing support for the status quo, saying that “Taiwan is already an independent sovereign country."
The CPC, PCJ letter says that the recent $8 billion military package authorized for Taiwan should be accompanied by a “robust diplomatic approach” that prioritizes “easing mutual misperceptions and misunderstandings that can undermine long-standing diplomatic agreements and precipitate violent military conflicts.”
Rep. Mark Takano (D-Calif.), one of the letter’s signatories, said in a press call on Friday that it’s important for progressives to “call out” China’s aggressive regional behavior, but added, “The fact that many members of both the CPC and PCJ are speaking with one voice in this letter is a testament to our mutual commitment to peace and stability,”
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Diplomacy Watch: A peace summit without Russia
Diplomacy Watch: What’s the point of Swiss peace summit?
For the first time since the February 2022 Russian invasion of Ukraine, the Ukrainian military this week launched what appears to be a major operation inside Russian territory, raising questions about why Kyiv is doing this now, what its overall strategic goals are, and whether Ukraine is violating prohibitions on the use of U.S.-supplied weapons inside Russia.
While Ukrainian officials have so far largely remained quiet about the operation, Russian sources are saying that the assault has involved at least 1,000 Ukrainian troops (quite possibly thousands more) supported by tanks, armored vehicles, drones and artillery. Those forces have reportedly advanced as far as six miles from the Ukrainian border into the Kursk region of Russia, toward the town of Sudzha, where Russian natural gas flows into Europe through a pipeline in Ukraine.
According to Reuters, some pro-Russian bloggers are also saying the Ukrainian forces are advancing toward a nuclear power station almost 40 miles northeast of Sudzha, but that claim has yet to be verified.
While some observers have questioned the strategic value of such a Ukrainian operation, possible motives could be to show Russians that they are increasingly vulnerable as the war drags on, to stop gas flows into Europe, to boost Ukrainian morale, or to force Moscow to redeploy defense forces from elsewhere along the Ukrainian front.
Or, the assault could be related to larger diplomatic efforts. According to the Washington Post, Mykhailo Podolyak, an adviser to Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, said on Ukrainian TV this week that — without specifically referencing the assault — any Ukrainian incursion into Russian territory “could better Ukraine’s position during future negotiations with Russia to end the war.”
The Biden administration had previously forbidden Ukraine from using U.S.-supplied weapons for any attacks inside Russian territory in an effort to prevent escalating the conflict. However, President Biden relaxed those rules in May, saying that the Ukrainian military could hit military targets inside Russia that were supporting Moscow’s offensive against the Ukrainian city of Kharkiv in the northeast. In June, the Pentagon announced that those rules would be relaxed further so that Ukraine could use U.S.-supplied weapons to attack military targets inside Russia anywhere along the border, not just near Kharkiv.
State Department spokesman Matthew Miller on Thursday said he wouldn’t comment on the Ukrainian assault but insisted that Russian attacks on Ukraine had come from the Kursk region, and thus Ukraine was adhering to the new, more relaxed policy. “Yes, in the area where [the Ukrainians] are currently operating across the Russian border we have seen attacks come from there,” he said.
In other diplomatic news related to the war in Ukraine:
— Reuters reported that Niger’s ruling junta cut diplomatic ties with Ukraine this week in response to Kyiv purportedly supporting rebel groups with ties to terrorist groups — including al-Qaida — in neighboring Mali that were fighting the Wagner Group, a Russian mercenary force. Mali’s junta had previously cut ties with Ukraine over the incident. The Russians accused Kyiv of opening an “African front” in their ongoing war in Eastern Europe.
— Quincy Institute Eurasia Research Fellow Mark Episkipos wonders whether we’ve seen a similar pattern of U.S. decision making regarding the war in Ukraine. “America’s trademark technical prowess … failed to pierce the fog of war in Vietnam because it proceeded from strategically unsound assumptions about the conflict’s broader dynamics and refused to correct course at key junctures,” he wrote this week in RS. “The variables at play in Ukraine are undoubtedly quite different, but the potential folly — wading knee deep into a protracted conflict without a realistic theory of victory — is much the same, and the stakes are similarly high.”
The Pentagon is in the midst of a massive $2 trillion multiyear plan to build a new generation of nuclear-armed missiles, bombers, and submarines. A large chunk of that funding will go to major nuclear weapons contractors like Bechtel, General Dynamics, Honeywell, Lockheed Martin, and Northrop Grumman. And they will do everything in their power to keep that money flowing.
This January, a review of the Sentinel intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM) program under the Nunn-McCurdy Act — a congressional provision designed to rein in cost overruns of Pentagon weapons programs — found that the missile, the crown jewel of the nuclear overhaul plan involving 450 missile-holding silos spread across five states, is already 81% over its original budget. It is now estimated that it will cost a total of nearly $141 billion to develop and purchase, a figure only likely to rise in the future.
That Pentagon review had the option of canceling the Sentinel program because of such a staggering cost increase. Instead, it doubled down on the program, asserting that it would be an essential element of any future nuclear deterrent and must continue, even if the funding for other defense programs has to be cut to make way for it. In justifying the decision, Deputy Defense Secretary William LaPlante stated: “We are fully aware of the costs, but we are also aware of the risks of not modernizing our nuclear forces and not addressing the very real threats we confront.”
Cost is indeed one significant issue, but the biggest risk to the rest of us comes from continuing to build and deploy ICBMs, rather than delaying or shelving the Sentinel program. As former Secretary of Defense William Perry has noted, ICBMs are “some of the most dangerous weapons in the world” because they “could trigger an accidental nuclear war.” As he explained, a president warned (accurately or not) of an enemy nuclear attack would have only minutes to decide whether to launch such ICBMs and conceivably devastate the planet.
Possessing such potentially world-ending systems only increases the possibility of an unintended nuclear conflict prompted by a false alarm. And as Norman Solomon and the late Daniel Ellsberg once wrote, “If reducing the dangers of nuclear war is a goal, the top priority should be to remove the triad’s ground-based leg — not modernize it.”
This is no small matter. It is believed that a large-scale nuclear exchange could result in more than five billion of us humans dying, once the possibility of a “nuclear winter” and the potential destruction of agriculture across much of the planet is taken into account, according to an analysis by International Physicians for the Prevention of Nuclear War.
In short, the need to reduce nuclear risks by eliminating such ICBMs could not be more urgent. The Bulletin of Atomic Scientists’ “Doomsday Clock” — an estimate of how close the world may be at any moment to a nuclear conflict — is now set at 90 seconds to midnight, the closest it’s been since that tracker was first created in 1947. And just this June, Russian President Vladimir Putin signed a mutual defense agreement with North Korean leader Kim Jong-un, a potential first step toward a drive by Moscow to help Pyongyang expand its nuclear arsenal further. And of the nine countries now possessing nuclear weapons, it’s hardly the only one other than the U.S. in an expansionist phase.
Considering the rising tide of nuclear escalation globally, is it really the right time for this country to invest a fortune of taxpayer dollars in a new generation of devastating “use them or lose them” weapons? The American public has long said no, according to a 2020 poll by the University of Maryland’s Program for Public Consultation, which showed that 61% of us actually support phasing out ICBM systems like the Sentinel.
The Pentagon’s misguided plan to keep such ICBMs in the U.S arsenal for decades to come is only reinforced by the political power of members of Congress and the companies that benefit financially from the current buildup.
Who decides? The role of the ICBM lobby
A prime example of the power of the nuclear weapons lobby is the Senate ICBM Coalition. That group is composed of senators from four states — Montana, North Dakota, Utah, and Wyoming — that either house major ICBM bases or host significant work on the Sentinel. Perhaps you won’t be surprised to learn that the members of that coalition have received more than $3 million in donations from firms involved in the production of the Sentinel over the past four election cycles. Nor were they alone. ICBM contractors made contributions to 92 of the 100 senators and 413 of the 435 house members in 2024. Some received hundreds of thousands of dollars.
The nuclear lobby paid special attention to members of the armed services committees in the House and Senate. For example, Mike Turner, a House Republican from Ohio, has been a relentless advocate of “modernizing” the nuclear arsenal. In a June 2024 talk at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, which itself has received well over a million dollars in funding from nuclear weapons producers, he called for systematically upgrading the nuclear arsenal for decades to come, while chiding any of his congressional colleagues not taking such an aggressive stance on the subject.
Although Turner vigorously touts the need for a costly nuclear buildup, he fails to mention that, with $305,000 in donations, he’s been the fourth-highest recipient of funding from the ICBM lobby over the four elections between 2018 and 2024. Little wonder that he pushes for new nuclear weapons and staunchly opposes extending the New START arms reduction treaty.
In another example of contractor influence, veteran Texas representative Kay Granger secured the largest total of contributions from the ICBM lobby of any House member. With $675,000 in missile contractor contributions in hand, Granger went to bat for the lobby, lending a feminist veneer to nuclear “modernization” by giving a speech on her experience as a woman in politics at Northrop Grumman’s Women’s conference. And we’re sure you won’t be surprised that Granger has anything but a strong track record when it comes to keeping the Pentagon and arms makers accountable for waste, fraud, and abuse in weapons programs. Her X account is, in fact, littered with posts heaping praise on Lockheed Martin and its overpriced, underperforming F-35 combat aircraft.
Other recipients of ICBM contractor funding, like Alabama Congressman Mike Rogers, have lamented the might of the “far-left disarmament community,” and the undue influence of “anti-nuclear zealots” on our politics. Missing from the statements his office puts together and the speeches his staffers write for him, however, is any mention of the $471,000 in funding he’s received so far from ICBM producers. You won’t be surprised, we’re sure, to discover that Rogers has pledged to seek a provision in the forthcoming National Defense Authorization Act to support the Pentagon’s plan to continue the Sentinel program.
Lobbying dollars and the revolving door
The flood of campaign contributions from ICBM contractors is reinforced by their staggering investments in lobbying. In any given year, the arms industry as a whole employs between 800 and 1,000 lobbyists, well more than one for every member of Congress. Most of those lobbyists hired by ICBM contractors come through the “revolving door” from careers in the Pentagon, Congress, or the Executive Branch. That means they come with the necessary tools for success in Washington: an understanding of the appropriations cycle and close relations with decision-makers on the Hill.
During the last four election cycles, ICBM contractors spent upwards of $226 million on 275 extremely well-paid lobbyists. For example, Bud Cramer, a former Democratic congressman from Alabama who once sat on the defense subcommittee of the House Appropriations Committee, netted $640,000 in fees from Northrop Grumman over a span of six years. He was also a cofounder of the Blue Dog Democrats, an influential conservative faction within the Democratic Party. Perhaps you won’t be surprised to learn that Cramer’s former chief of staff, Jefferies Murray, also lobbies for Northrop Grumman.
While some lobbyists work for one contractor, others have shared allegiances. For example, during his tenure as a lobbyist, former Senate Appropriations Committee Chair Trent Lott received more than $600,000 for his efforts for Raytheon, Textron Inc., and United Technologies (before United Technologies and Raytheon merged to form RX Technologies). Former Virginia Congressman Jim Moran similarly received $640,000 from Northrop Grumman and General Dynamics.
Playing the jobs card
The argument of last resort for the Sentinel and similar questionable weapons programs is that they create well-paying jobs in key states and districts. Northrop Grumman has played the jobs card effectively with respect to the Sentinel, claiming it will create 10,000 jobs in its development phase alone, including about 2,250 in the state of Utah, where the hub for the program is located.
As a start, however, those 10,000 jobs will help a minuscule fraction of the 167-million-member American workforce. Moreover, Northrop Grumman claims facilities tied to the program will be set up in 32 states. If 2,250 of those jobs end up in Utah, that leaves 7,750 more jobs spread across 31 states — an average of about 250 jobs per state, essentially a rounding error compared to total employment in most localities.
Nor has Northrop Grumman provided any documentation for the number of jobs the Sentinel program will allegedly create. Journalist Taylor Barnes of ReThink Media was rebuffed in her efforts to get a copy of the agreement between Northrop Grumman and the state of Utah that reportedly indicates how many Sentinel-related jobs the company needs to create to get the full subsidy offered to put its primary facility in Utah.
A statement by a Utah official justifying that lack of transparency suggested Northrop Grumman was operating in “a competitive defense industry” and that revealing details of the agreement might somehow harm the company. But any modest financial harm Northrop Grumman might suffer, were those details revealed, pales in comparison with the immense risks and costs of the Sentinel program itself.
There are two major flaws in the jobs argument with respect to the future production of nuclear weapons. First, military spending should be based on security considerations, not pork-barrel politics. Second, as Heidi Peltier of the Costs of War Project has effectively demonstrated, virtually any other expenditure of funds currently devoted to Pentagon programs would create between 9% and 250% more jobs than weapons spending does. If Congress were instead to put such funds into addressing climate change, dealing with future disease epidemics, poverty, or homelessness — all serious threats to public safety — the American economy would gain hundreds of thousands of jobs. Choosing to fund those ICBMs instead is, in fact, a job killer, not a job creator.
Unwarranted influence in the nuclear age
Advocates for eliminating ICBMs from the American arsenal make a strong case. (If only they were better heard!) For example, former Representative John Tierney of the Center for Arms Control and Nonproliferation offered this blunt indictment of ICBMs:
“Not only are intercontinental ballistic missiles redundant, but they are prone to a high risk of accidental use…They do not make us any safer. Their only value is to the defense contractors who line their fat pockets with large cost overruns at the expense of our taxpayers. It has got to stop.”
The late Daniel Ellsberg made a similar point in a February 2018 interview with the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists:
“You would not have these arsenals, in the U.S. or elsewhere, if it were not the case that it was highly profitable to the military-industrial complex, to the aerospace industry, to the electronics industry, and to the weapons design labs to keep modernizing these weapons, improving accuracy, improving launch time, all that. The military-industrial complex that Eisenhower talked about is a very powerful influence. We’ve talked about unwarranted influence. We’ve had that for more than half a century.”
Given how the politics of Pentagon spending normally work, that nuclear weapons policy is being so heavily influenced by individuals and organizations profiting from an ongoing arms race should be anything but surprising. Still, in the case of such weaponry, the stakes are so high that critical decisions shouldn’t be determined by parochial politics. The influence of such special interest groups and corporate weapons-makers over life-and-death issues should be considered both a moral outrage and perhaps the ultimate security risk.
Isn’t it finally time for the executive branch and Congress to start assessing the need for ICBMs on their merits, rather than on contractor lobbying, weapons company funding, and the sort of strategic thinking that was already outmoded by the end of the 1950s? For that to happen, our representatives would need to hear from their constituents loud and clear.
This article was originally published at Tom Dispatch and was republished with permission.
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