RESOLUTION ON A

NATIONAL DAY OF ACTION AGAINST U.S. WARS

AT HOME AND ABROAD

IN SPRING 2018

WHEREAS, the United States has been in a state of perpetual war and has been using its unrivaled military might in every corner of the world to subdue, dominate and exploit sovereign nations for the benefit of its rich and powerful elite and corporations in violation of international law; and

WHEREAS, U.S. military and war budget almost equals that of the rest of the world combined, reaching $700 billion, not including discretionary war expenses, after a bipartisan vote in the U.S. Senate in September 2017; and

WHEREAS, while the United States ranks first by far in military spending, it ranks 7th in literacy, 20th in education, 25th in infrastructure quality, 37th in quality of health care, 31st in life expectancy, and 56th in infant mortality; and

WHEREAS, the bipartisan militaristic foreign policy and spending has enriched the coffers of the war industry, causing ever-higher levels of economic inequality, racial, ethnic and gender discrimination and oppression, poverty, hunger and homelessness; and

WHEREAS, the global militarization and racism of U.S. war policy has greatly increased the militarization of the police, attacks on civil liberties and the growth of White Supremacy at home; and

WHEREAS, since 2001 the United States has used its military force for invading and bombing in numerous countries — Afghanistan, Iraq, Libya, Syria, Yemen, Somalia, Sudan, Pakistan, eventually costing the American taxpayers $4 trillion in Afghanistan and Iraq alone — and is now threatening to attack Iran and North Korea; and

WHEREAS, the United States maintains close to 1,000 foreign military bases and tens of thousands of troops in more than 175 countries of the world at the cost of over $150 billion a year; and

WHEREAS, the bipartisan militarization of our foreign policy has led to the death of an untold number of civilians, terror by drones, destruction of infrastructure and the environment, massive number of refugees, creating chaos and terrorism by destabilizing sovereign nations; and

WHEREAS, 6,831 U.S. military personnel have died in wars in Iraq and Afghanistan and about one million have been injured, in addition to hundreds of thousands of civilian casualties caused by U.S. wars; and

WHEREAS, there are over 39,000 homeless military veterans; on any night, more than 1.4 million are at high risk of homelessness, of which 9 percent are female veterans, and 20 military veterans/active duty military take their own lives each day; and

WHEREAS, the development and enlargement of nuclear armaments has heightened the threat of nuclear annihilation; and

WHEREAS, it is vital that the workers, unions, and peace, social justice and environmentalist forces unite in a joint movement to promote a foreign policy independent of the political and economic interests of Wall Street, corporate America and the military-industrial complex;

THEREFORE, BE IT RESOLVED, that the organizations endorsing the Coalition Against U.S. Foreign Military Bases and are present at the Conference on U.S. Foreign Military Bases convened in Baltimore, Maryland, call upon all peace, social justice and environmental forces in the United States to join hands in organizing a United National Day of Anti-War Action in the Spring of 2018 to demand:

— Ending all U.S. wars, bombings and drone attacks, and other forms of U.S. aggression including economic sanctions and weapons sales;

— Closing of all U.S. bases on foreign soil;

— Bringing all U.S. troops home;

— Using the funds of the massive military budget for human needs and protection of the environment;

— Dismantling all nuclear weapons.

BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED, that the Coordinating Committee of the Coalition Against U.S. Foreign Military Bases and the organizations and activists present at this Conference commit ourselves to helping with the organization of this United National Day of Anti-War Action and we invite our international friends to join us.