If I was a bettin' man; feel lucky, yet?

 

From Anti-War.com

On Thursday, a group of Republicans introduced a bill in the House and Senate that would reaffirm NATO’s Article 5 does not override congressional war powers. The effort was led by Sen. Rand Paul (R-KY) and Reps. Chip Roy (R-TX) and Warren Davidson (R-OH).

“I introduced a resolution reasserting that Article 5 of the NATO Treaty does not supersede Congress’s responsibility to declare war or authorize military force before engaging in hostilities,” Paul wrote in Responsible Statecraft.

NATO’s Article 5 outlines mutual defense commitments of the 31-member alliance but does not automatically mean the US must intervene militarily if a NATO ally comes under attack.

“For decades, many legislators have incorrectly interpreted Article 5 as an obligation that unquestionably commits the United States to provide military support should a NATO ally be attacked,” he wrote.

Article 5 states: “The Parties agree that an armed attack against one or more of them in Europe or North America shall be considered an attack against them all and consequently they agree that, if such an armed attack occurs, each of them, in exercise of the right of individual or collective self-defense recognized by Article 51 of the Charter of the United Nations, will assist the Party or Parties so attacked by taking forthwith, individually and in concert with the other Parties, such action as it deems necessary, including the use of armed force.”

Paul noted that while NATO members are required to assist each other in the event of an attack, military action is not mandated. “Furthermore, Article 11 of the NATO Treaty states that the provisions of the Treaty are to be carried out in accordance with each country’s respective constitutional processes,” he wrote.

The legislation Paul introduced would express that Article 5 does not “supersede the constitutional requirement that Congress declare war or authorize the use of military force prior to the United States engaging in hostilities.”

The bill was cosponsored in the Senate by Mike Braun (R-IN), Mike Lee (R-UT), Cynthia Lummis (R-WY), and Josh Hawley (R-MO). Hawley was the only senator to vote against Sweden and Finland joining NATO. Explaining his reasoning for the vote, Hawley said he wants the US to focus on building alliances in the Asia Pacific, as he is a major China hawk. Paul voted “present” on admitting Sweden and Finland.

In the House, the Article 5 legislation was cosponsored by Reps. Dan Bishop (R-NC), Troy Nehls (R-TX), Harriet Hageman (R-WY), Paul Gosar (R-AZ), Andy Biggs (R-AZ), Andrew Clyde (R-GA), Matt Rosendale (R-MT), and Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-GA).

NATO’s Article 5 does not override US Congress’s war powers

 

 

 Neo-Con US Senators Blumenthal and Graham hold up a quote by President Puddin' Head

 

 The WAPO and NYT are already running puff pieces claiming a nuke exchange would be an "inconvenience", and suggest using Duck tape and plastic bags over doors and windows.

Just not in my back yard. How's your garden?

NATO’s Article 5 does not override Congress’s war powers

We must make clear that ‘an attack on one is an attack on all’ does not automatically trigger a US military response.

June 22, 2023

Written by
Senator Rand Paul

 

When faced with questions relating to America’s role in the world, we would be wise to heed the advice of our Founding Founders. George Washington urged distance from the “frequent controversies” of Europe. Thomas Jefferson pursued a course of “peace, commerce, and honest friendship with all nations, entangling alliances with none.”

As NATO continues its post-Cold War expansion, it is worth pointing out that, by its own terms, the NATO Treaty does not commit Americans to the military defense of our allies. To that end, I introduced a resolution reasserting that Article 5 of the NATO Treaty does not supersede Congress’s responsibility to declare war or authorize military force before engaging in hostilities.  

For decades, many legislators have incorrectly interpreted Article 5 as an obligation that unquestionably commits the United States to provide military support should a NATO ally be attacked. To support their assertion, those who pine for a perpetual Pax Americana paraphrase Article 5 of the NATO Treaty by stating that, “an attack against one or is an attack against all.” 

But that is not exactly what Article 5 states. Article 5 states, “The Parties agree that an armed take against one or more of them . . . shall be considered an attack against them all and . . . each of them, in exercise of the right of individual or collective self-defense . . . will assist the Party or Parties so attacked by taking forthwith . . . such action as it deems necessary, including the use of armed force…” In other words, NATO allies are committed to assist each other in the event of an attack, but military action is not mandated, and the United States maintains its sovereign capacity to determine what kind of response is warranted. 

Furthermore, Article 11 of the NATO Treaty states that the provisions of the Treaty are to be carried out in accordance with each country’s respective constitutional processes.

The Constitution grants to Congress the sole authority to determine where and when we send our sons and daughters to fight. We cannot delegate that responsibility to the president, the courts, an international body, or our allies. This is a constitutional responsibility that all members of Congress have freely taken and one that the American people expect us to uphold.

I proposed the same text of my resolution when the Senate was considering the inclusion of Sweden and Finland into NATO. At the time, some of my colleagues questioned my approach, and one in particular argued that that my proposal would demonstrate to our allies that the United States is going “wobbly” on Article 5. I would argue that our men and women in the field do not want Congress to go wobbly on the Constitution.

Over the years, there has been a disturbing trend of executive overreach, undermining the checks and balances that our founders established to prevent such abuses of power. Collective defense should not be used as a pretext to bypass the constitutional requirement for congressional approval. By clarifying that the NATO Treaty does not supersede the Constitution, we can respond to those who would deceive the public about what America’s commitments are and renew our commitment to the highest law in the land. Respecting congressional war powers does not hinder our national security or imply a disregard for treaties. On the contrary, it ensures that the decision to use military force is subjected to rigorous scrutiny and debate by the representatives of the people, just as our Founding Fathers intended.

We must continue to show our fealty to the Constitution and elevate diplomacy to the forefront of United States foreign relations. For years I’ve led the fight to return war-making powers to Congress where they belong, and I’m proud to continue those efforts by introducing this resolution with support in the Senate and House of Representatives. It’s long past time that we respect the balance of power and reassert Congress’s voice.

Responsible Statecraft

Housekeeping

 

Running an eye over content (cripes sake, more unintelligible 20th century jargon?) has gone apace, consuming the three years prior.  Everything, I mean everything, can be improved. Forever. Depending on my mood or airs. Lucidity. That, too.

Otherwise, I view what posts have been viewed and edit on the fly; for content, layout, and, larger type. Better late than never, its less embarrassing that way. Plausible deniability.

I still intend, eventually, to learn how to write haikai. The skill of fitting Mississippi, or say refrigerator, into a poem, with panache, still eludes me though.

Continuing to add links in haikai, asymmetry and news items I find of interest; 

Some links, like Japanese Storytelling at Bedtime, don't work. I keep it for sentimental reasons. Another is a blog of a woman I fell for, hard - through correspondence. More than an infatuation, I loved her for her mind, and mentorship, her courage. We two were the only bloggers in existence who listed The Westerner as a favorite movie. That's how we met. I remember it well; we spoke about our affection for dogs, actually ,,,

She made her keep as a writer. She wrote like a dream, in fact, with nuance, knowledge and gorgeous phrasings. Resourceful as she was intelligent, she could submit on any subject - she'd knock it down for a few dollars more, reliant on the quality of her craft, even professing to be an authority in different careers. Just enough detail to support a suggestion, say, as example, she was a microbiologist. Fifty cents a word, and never dyed a pathogen to identify under a microscope, putting her in league with institutions such as the CDC.

For that deft deception I adored her, even more so for her dry wit and like me, a solitary manner. By coincidence, both of us were of Norwegian descent, attuned to that taciturn insight inherent of our ancestry despite living a continent apart. You see, we never met in person, yet I affectionately called her Swede.

Fool that I am, I ended up alienating her. Facebook, that platform of division, was involved, of that I'm certain. Resentment of her superior talent, perhaps, I'd reverted to mansplaining that Hillary Clinton was the chosen one to advance the USA's greatest deception; The Rumsfeld/Cebrowski doctrine, intending all the world's inhabitants to be its vassals.
 

Unable to persuade her, in a pathetic, Minnesota Nice/passive aggressive gesture I called her Mrs. Parker.  I'd crossed the line. For that petty indiscretion by my own hand, I had become the un-friend. .

 What mysterious impulse could have forced it? The hour, the season, the ill conceived perfection of a social media apparatus honing its behavioral modification savvy to serve a darker agenda?

There may be a waka poem or two in these pages, also. The feeling's there, the pattern, the partner ... I'll not tell for fear of my in-hesitant heart.

Most remaining rubbish is the result of my sloth and neglect. I beg your pardon.

Unless, I might want to balance a section - I've overlooked tsuri-dōrō until now - or a region, by adding Nikkei Asia today. It seems as indifferent a journal, thus objective, as Interfax or Swiss Policy Research may be. 

One recent Nikkei lead informed of the opening of the first NATO liaison office in Asia next year, in the country of Japan. The report said NATO and Japan will take more steps to increase cooperation by signing an agreement known as an Individually Tailored Partnership Programme ahead of the NATO summit that will be held in Vilnius, Lithuania, in June. Japan also plans to open an independent mission to NATO, separate from the Embassy in Belgium.

Will the black ships sail once again, I wonder? 

Oh, look, I've misspelled liaison.

Revisiting Ron Paul's 2004 House-Floor Speech Calling For Disbanding NATO, or, How We All Got Schlonged

 

 On March 30, 2004 - just over 19 years ago, then-Representative Ron Paul (R-TX) concluded a United States House of Representatives statement with a strong admonition regarding the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) and US involvement in it.

 

Read Paul’s 2004 statement here:

Mr. Speaker, I rise in opposition to this resolution. I do so because further expansion of NATO, an outdated alliance, is not in our national interest and may well constitute a threat to our national security in the future.

More than 50 years ago the North Atlantic Treaty Organization was formed to defend Western Europe and the United States against attack from the communist nations of Eastern Europe. It was an alliance of sovereign nations bound together in common purpose — for mutual defense. The deterrence value of NATO helped kept the peace throughout the Cold War. In short, NATO achieved its stated mission. With the fall of the Soviet system and the accompanying disappearance of the threat of attack, in 1989—1991, NATO’s reason to exist ceased. Unfortunately, as with most bureaucracies, the end of NATO’s mission did not mean the end of NATO. Instead, heads of NATO member states gathered in 1999 desperately attempting to devise new missions for the outdated and adrift alliance. This is where NATO moved from being a defensive alliance respecting the sovereignty of its members to an offensive and interventionist organization, concerned now with "economic, social and political difficulties…ethnic and religious rivalries, territorial disputes, inadequate or failed efforts at reform, the abuse of human rights, and the dissolution of states," in the words of the Washington 1999 Summit.

And we saw the fruits of this new NATO mission in the former Yugoslavia, where the US, through NATO, attacked a sovereign state that threatened neither the United States nor its own neighbors. In Yugoslavia, NATO abandoned the claim it once had to the moral high ground. The result of the illegal and immoral NATO intervention in the Balkans speaks for itself: NATO troops will occupy the Balkans for the foreseeable future. No peace has been attained, merely the cessation of hostilities and a permanent dependency on US foreign aid.

The further expansion of NATO is in reality a cover for increased US interventionism in Europe and beyond. It will be a conduit for more unconstitutional US foreign aid and US interference in the internal politics of member nations, especially the new members from the former East.

It will also mean more corporate welfare at home. As we know, NATO membership demands a minimum level of military spending of its member states. For NATO’s new members, the burden of significantly increased military spending when there are no longer external threats is hard to meet. Unfortunately, this is where the US government steps in, offering aid and subsidized loans to these members so they can purchase more unneeded and unnecessary military equipment. In short, it is nothing more than corporate welfare for the US military industrial complex.

The expansion of NATO to these seven countries, we have heard, will open them up to the further expansion of US military bases, right up to the border of the former Soviet Union. Does no one worry that this continued provocation of Russia might have negative effects in the future? Is it necessary?

Further, this legislation encourages the accession of Albania, Macedonia, and Croatia — nations that not long ago were mired in civil and regional wars. The promise of US military assistance if any of these states are attacked is obviously a foolhardy one. What will the mutual defense obligations we are entering into mean if two Balkan NATO members begin hostilities against each other (again)?

In conclusion, we should not be wasting US tax money and taking on more military obligations expanding NATO. The alliance is a relic of the Cold War, a hold-over from another time, an anachronism. It should be disbanded, the sooner the better.

In 2012, Ron Paul's bid for the Republican Presidential nominee was abruptly stymied.
At the convention that year, the tally was close enough to broker the convention - maintain enough delegate's votes to break the front runner's advantage of pre-assigned delegates, and subsequently, sweep up enough support from those unhindered in choice to win the nomination in extra ballots. 

After a voice vote over a last minute rule change to block Dr. Paul, the motion overwhelmingly rejected in the Dr.'s favor, the Convention chairman instead recited,  "the ayes have it" , reading each word directly from a teleprompter.

Angry shouting and calls for order broke out in the stadium with other calls for point of order. An abuse of Parliamentary Procedure had just been blatantly exposed on national television! More booing and cat calls turned the agenda into havoc.

It was to no avail. The chairman simply ignored the protests, adjourned the meeting, and turning his back on the assemblage, then walked, unrepentant, directly the off stage.

The only real anti-war candidate in 50 years had just been bamboozled.


So, what's next? Without a doubt, every western leader, led by the US' unelected, Neo-Con faction currently domineering all US foreign policy, is in a collaboration to prolong Ukraine's ten years of civil war against the domination of its own citizens.  The eventual goal is to incite a world war with Russia, which is currently involved enforcing UN resolution 2202 that would allow the Ukraine's disabused population the right to autonomy and self-representation. Since 2014, 20,000 of those men, women and children have been assassinated with the aid and knowledge of the conspirators.

The end game, without listing other factors, most likely means the dissolution of the United States as a country within the next ten years. That is, the USA will lose any endeavor to conquer the rest of the world. It should outlast the EU, however, by some good measure. They have destroyed their own bond market already.

The interim? This is gonna hurt. Might even leave a mark. Bandit may just earn his name. At least it won't be dull.

74th Year and Still Going Strong!