WAR AND PEACE

 The Texas flooding catastrophe is up to 119 dead and 160 still missing.

Both the Texas storm and the July 7 North Carolina flood caused by Tropical Storm Chantal were 1000-year events.  And President Donald Trump is encouraging greater use of fossil fuels, while cutting back on global warming research.

• A 100-year flood means that there is a 1% chance that this will happen at your home's location in any given year.
• A 1000-year flood means there is a 0.1% chance of this occurring.
• Read details here.

Now, on to the topic of today.  My field of knowledge primarily spans from energy to the environment and into ocean resources.  I drafted when working in the U.S. Senate the original hydrogen bill which became law, and same for ocean thermal energy conversion.  My first job was in biomass engineering, and I later did research in geothermal energy, wind energy and grew marine microalgae in a raceway fed by the waste gases from a small powerplant to someday remediate global warming.  At the University of Hawaii I taught energy and environmental engineering courses, and directed the Hawaii Natural Energy Institute for 15 years.

I've authored three books and co-authored a few others, most them dealing with energy.  Wrote more than a hundred articles for the Huffington Post in its infancy, and many of them remain meaningful.  All condense a full paper into one page, so if you wish a quick summary of topics such as the Blue Revolution, the best biofuel, geoengineering of climate change and next generation aviation, click on this.

Interestingly enough, though, my very first HuffPo was on world peace entitled, Well, Barack, We have a Problem...  

You go to your very first G8 Nations Summit, by your declared emergency to be held at United Nations headquarters in New York City, and pronounce a Gorbachev-like bombshell: our country will reduce military spending by 10% this year, and will continue to do so for the next eight years. This scenario is described on page 65 of my Book 2. You say, we want every country to do the same, for this 10% solution is our best response to Peak Oil and Global Warming. At this stage, keep quiet about the "ending wars forever" part, as then, no one will take you too seriously.

I later wrote a HuffPo on The 10% Solution, then more specifically, The 10% Simple Solution to Peace, which starts with these two paragraphs.

What are the truly monumental problems facing our society and how do we fix them? I dealt with one, Global Climate Change, in my previous HuffPo post. Just a 5 cents/pound carbon dioxide credit (or tax) is all we need to save Planet Earth and Humanity. At this writing, there were 64 comments, and while most were supportive, a few just did not get the point. I was using sarcasm and fear instead of almost useless pure logic.

On this Independence Day when I am clicking this article, I thought it was particularly appropriate to take a closer look at the second most important issue: war and peace. When I worked for U.S. Senator Spark Matsunaga, considerable effort was extended towards legislation for the U.S. Peace Academy. Sparky, who earned a Purple Heart in the European Theater, actually still had a piece of shrapnel in his leg. He felt that if the Nation had all those war universities, why not a U.S. Peace Academy to train emissaries for goodwill. The best he could get was the U.S. Institute of Peace.

What got me into peace was seeing how much the U.S. spent on military expenditures, when, for the sake of Humanity, it made much more sense for the world to be applying these funds to remediate global warming.  

• For example, do you realize that the USA accounts for 40% of funds spent for war by the whole world.  In fact, we apply more to "defense" than the NEXT 9 COUNTRIES COMBINED!!!

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  This information is supplied by the Peter Peterson Foundation, established in 2008 for a billion dollars.  He is a former U.S. Secretary of Commerce in the Nixon Administration, and co-founder of the Blackstone Group.  The Advisory Board currently consists of former Senator Bill Bradley, Secretary of Treasury Robert Rubin, Secretary of Health and Human Services and Secretary of State George Schultz, and others.  Peterson passed away 7 years ago.

So why do we spend so much on war?

• For national security and deterrence.  Strength through power.  To make sure really bad leaders take us seriously.
• Global power influence.
• Economic considerations.  Stimulates economy and provides jobs.

As I indicated, I once worked in Congress more than 40 years ago, and noted that lobbying from the defense industry was overpowering.  I would imagine nothing much has changed.  In 1961 President Dwight Eisenhower's farewell address warned the American public about the military-industrial complex.  And, remember, he was a general who led us to victory in World War II.  He underscored that the profit motives of defense contractors influenced them to exaggerate genuine security needs.  The result is that other needs like education, infrastructure and the environment are sacrificed.  Watch this farewell address.  

From Google AI Overview:

• More than half (54%) of Department Defense discretionary spending goes to defense contractors.
• From 2020-2024, private firms received $2.4 trillion in contracts from the Pentagon.

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  Five firms (Lockheed Martin, RTX, Boeing, General Dynamics and Northrup Grumman) go $771 billion of those funds.
• Over the past 35 years, the Pentagon has devoted an increasing share to defense contractors.  Eisenhower's warning was 64 years ago.

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  Defense contractors spend roughly $140 million annually on lobbying, much to campaign contributions.  Yes, this is Democratic Senator Bernie Sanders, but read his thoughts about this scurrilous reality.  
• He says the U.S. spends more on its military than the next 10 countries combined, but maybe he has more recent data.
• Their CEOs make 100 times more than the secretary of defense and 500 times more than the average newly enlisted service member.

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  The DOD always fails their audit, and recently couldn't account for 63% of its $3.8 trillion in assets.
• No one denies that we need a strong military. But, like every other agency of government, it must be run efficiently and cost-effectively. It cannot simply be a cash cow for a handful of giant corporations.

I annually refer to the Global Peace Index.  For 2025:

• The average level of country peacefulness deteriorated by 0.36 percent in the 2025 Global Peace Index. This is the sixth consecutive year that global peacefulness has deteriorated.

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  The average country score on the GPI has also deteriorated for 13 of the past 17 years, and has not improved on average in any year since the 2013 GPI.
• Global military spending hit a record $2.7 trillion in 2024, a nine per cent increase from the previous year, driven largely by conflicts such as the war in Ukraine.

Thus about War and Peace, sure Humanity desires universal peace, but in all of history, this has never happened.  I asked Google AI Overview.  Response?  There is no period in recorded history where the entire world has experience complete and sustained peace.

In short:

• No one anywhere has complete peace, even at home, and when some live alone.  Think about this.  Is conflict an inherent part of human nature?
• Certainly, defense contractors will continue to do what it does.
• The concept of world peace as a complete and sustained absence of conflict remains an ideal more than a historical reality.  Maybe forever, until we are replaced by Artificial Intelligence.

Why depress yourself.  Here are the 100 Best Songs about War and Peace.

1. “Imagine”—John Lennon

2. “Blowin’ in the Wind”—Bob Dylan

3. “Song of Bangladesh”—Joan Baez

4. “Fortunate Son”—Creedence Clearwater Revival

5. “All These Things That I’ve Done”—The Killers

6. “Give Peace a Chance”—Plastic Ono Band

7. “Bulls on Parade”—Rage Against the Machine

8. “Sunday Bloody Sunday”—U2

9. “Eye of Destruction”—Barry McGuire

10. “The Fiddle and the Drum”—Joni Mitchell

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