Sign my petition: tell Congress to pass legislation that would prohibit military action against Iran without Congressional approval.
Sign my petition: Tell Congress to pass legislation that would prohibit military action against Iran without Congressional approval.
Alfred -
Here is a truth you don’t often hear in the newspapers, on television or in the halls of Congress, but it is a truth we must face, especially as the Trump administration appears to be marching us closer to armed conflict with Iran:
And that truth is that far too often American intervention and the use of American military power has produced unintended consequences which have caused incalculable harm.
Real American power is not demonstrated by our ability to blow things up, but our ability to forge international consensus around shared challenges.
A test of a great nation is not how many wars we can engage in or how many governments we can overthrow, but how we can use our strength to resolve international conflicts in a peaceful way.
And it is almost beyond impossible to imagine that after the horrors of the war in Iraq — a war that upended the regional order of the Middle East and resulted in an untold loss of life — that this administration would put us on such a dangerous path toward more war. But everyday we see a new story about how this administration is trying provoke conflict, like sending huge bombers to the region, or raising the possibility of sending more than 100,000 troops.
Apparently for some, almost two decades of constant war is not enough.
Well, unfortunately for this president and people like John Bolton who love endless wars, the constitutional authority for declaring war rests with the United States Congress — not the president –– no matter if that president is a Democrat or a Republican.
And it is long past time my colleagues in the Senate reassert that authority. That is something I tried to do with my colleagues to stop our involvement in the war in Yemen, and it is something we must do again as the president marches us toward war with Iran.
Please add your name if you agree:
One of the first speeches I gave in Congress was about the first war in Iraq in 1991; a war I voted against.
And what I said at the time was that our challenge at that moment was not simply to begin a war which would result in tremendous suffering and death, but that the real challenge was to address international conflict without war and bloodshed.
It seemed to me that it would be a terrible failing, and very ominous for our future, if we could not solve that problem non-violently when virtually the entire world was united against one small country. And that if we were not successful in that effort, all this world would have to look forward to in the future would be war, and more war, and more war.
There are a number of parallels to this moment in time.
Today, our most important allies are committed to preventing the possibility that Iran’s undemocratic regime could ever obtain a nuclear weapon.
That is what the Iran deal was all about. And that was why it was such a reckless mistake for Trump to withdraw from the Iran deal, as even his own top security officials said at the time. Rather than remain united with those allies, Trump's approach has actually isolated the United States from them, undermining the important consensus that the Obama administration helped forge, and raising the possibility of conflict.
And it seems to me that, once again, if we turn our backs on a non-violent solution in favor of more military conflict, that we will find ourselves in perpetual warfare. Mark my words. A war in Iran would make the Iraq war look like a walk in the park. It will be an unmitigated disaster.
So Congress must intervene and utilize its constitutional authority — before it’s too late.
And I hope you’ll make your voice heard if you agree:
Throughout the world today, hundreds of millions of people live in abysmal poverty while the arms merchants of the world grow increasingly rich as governments spend trillions of dollars on weapons and war.
Our job is to offer a different vision — a vision that one day human beings on this planet will live in a world where international conflicts are resolved peacefully, not by mass murder.
In solidarity,
Bernie Sanders
Paid for by Bernie 2020
PO BOX 391, Burlington, VT 05402
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