Berlin, Germany (Weltexpress). In the WELTEXPRESS, a media release with the subject “War against our planet Earth” from the Ethecon Ethics & Economics Foundation based in Düsseldorf dated 23 March 2024 is documented as follows:
On the occasion of the currently rising threat of war and the impending environmental catastrophe, the ethecon Foundation has issued a joint statement by the Board of Directors and the Board of Trustees, making the connection between the two and explaining why disarmament of the military is also environmental protection!
The military is destroying the foundations of human life
It is becoming increasingly obvious: planet Earth is in danger. The climate and other foundations of human life are on the brink of collapse.
Military & wars are killing the planet
In addition to the capitalist economy with its solely profit-driven corporations and the omnipresent terror of consumption, rampant military structures, escalating large-scale maneuvers, exploding armaments and raging wars are primarily responsible for the looming dangers for people and the environment. According to the SIPRI , global spending on armaments and the military will have risen to the unimaginable sum of 2.2 trillion euros by 2022.
Many countries provide little or no information on the ecological damage caused by military activities. The USA even ensured that military emissions were excluded from the Kyoto Protocol signed in 1997 to save the climate.
One example: a Eurofighter consumes 70 – 100 liters of kerosene per minute. Around 30,000 take-offs and landings take place every year at the Ramstein military base in Germany alone. This releases 1.35 billion m³ of climate-damaging exhaust gases.
Armaments and wars are operations of destruction against humanity and its planet.
Misery and death even in peace
Even without wars, the military-industrial complex claims countless human lives through hunger, misery and disease. Its very existence is destroying the climate and all other foundations of life on our planet. Species extinction, littering of habitats including near-Earth space, overfishing of the oceans, air pollution, deforestation of the rainforests, poisoning of the soil, air and water and thus of food, the ruin of human health and social systems – everything is largely due to the military.
The removal of damage after the end of wars, military conflicts and maneuvers consumes vast amounts of resources and causes further dangerous emissions.
The focus is on profits
In global capitalism, profit rules with corporations as the battleships of capital.
For military corporations, the military, armaments and war directly and immediately mean maximum profits. But civilian industry also needs the military and armaments for its profits. The military around the world is assigned to secure access to raw materials, sales markets, secure transport routes and cheap labor for their profit-driven production.
At the same time, the ultra-rich and their corporations are responsible for a policy that also ruins social systems and the political climate and promotes nationalism, racism, neo-colonialism and neo-fascism by legitimizing armaments, the military, manoeuvres and war in the interests of profits.
Disarmament and disbandment of the military now and immediately!
Planet Earth, the climate and people’s livelihoods need disarmament, arms conversion, conflict resolution through negotiations and collective action for security and peace. Now and immediately!
ethecon Foundation Ethics & Economics demands disclosure of the climate and environmental balance sheets of the military and the arms industry, inclusion of climate-damaging emissions from the military and armaments in the terms of the Paris Climate Agreement, total disarmament and arms conversion as well as the use of savings from armaments and military budgets to save the livelihoods of humanity on our planet Earth!
In order to produce and trade in a peaceful, socially just and ecologically sound manner, the social order must be transformed away from egoism and personal advantage, away from the dictates of profit and towards democracy, solidarity and friendship among nations. Instead of more uncontrolled rights for corporations and financial investors, what is needed is the overthrow of the dictate of profit and the supremacy of solidarity and friendship among nations!
