THE WISER WAY

While US policy is concerned with avoiding the acute consequences of WMD on American soil, the equivalent of silent weapons of mass destruction are exploding every day as a result of widespread poverty, lack of medical care, lack of clean water (5,000 children die needlessly every day from waterborne illnesses), lack of cheap and available medicines, global climate change and the inequitable world economic system. All of these factors conspire to cause the widespread and lifelong suffering of many millions of people, who must endure hunger, disease and abject poverty.

SGR believes that the current US approach to achieving world “security” is dangerous and misguided. However, while it is easy to blame the US, we should remember that in the broader historical context there have been swings of power resulting in just the sort of overbearing, unilateralist and self-interested policies that we are seeing today. Any nation is capable of reaching this stage in its evolution and to some extent we are all locked in to the global system that benefits from and feeds into US wealth. Ultimately, when the system proves unsustainable, the US will be in no better position to benefit from its current policies than will any other country.

The real requirement now is to recognise the need for a society based on cooperation rather than competition. As part of this transformation SGR suggests that greater long-term security could be created by spending a proportion — even a small fraction — of military budgets on critical world problems, such as debt relief, water supplies or the reconstruction of war-torn countries.

For example, $100 billion dollars (i.e. 30% of the annual US military budget or roughly twice the cost of this current conflict) would: provide $20 per annum for 5 billion of the world’s poorest people; dwarf current aid programmes; go more than half way towards giving the world clean water; or provide the first of five instalments to reduce world poverty by half.

Far preferable for energy security, meanwhile, would be to pursue policies aimed at reducing the oil dependence of the western world (thereby simultaneously undermining the power held by unsavoury dictators) and at the same time to pursue consistent foreign policies that support human rights and ban weapons sales.

If the oil-dependent countries could reduce their dependence upon long oil routes by developing comprehensive renewable energy programmes, this would not only preclude further “oil wars” but would also reduce the environmental impacts of fresh oil exploration in the remote, untapped regions of the world. Even more importantly, it would help ameliorate that other developing crisis — climate change — which will itself result in huge problems of world security and conflict due to water shortages, displaced populations, floods and famine.

Security and peace can come only when wealthy nations recognise that all human beings share the same needs and that all deserve to be treated as equal partners in the world.