JPT Practice # 9: Reduce Offensive Weapons and the Weapons Trade

Okay, to a pacifist like myself, all weapons are “offensive,” but this refers to weapons whose nature makes them more useful for attack than defense. Work to eliminate “weapons of mass destruction,” (chemical, biological, and nuclear weapons) are vital–and no nation can simultaneously work to prevent the spread of these weapons, and insist on its own right to possess them and develop more. Further, some “conventional” weapons are, by nature, more offensive, such as cluster bombs which do much more damage to civilians than combat troops,and landmines which, long after wars are over, continue to kill and maim civilian populations. The use of spent uranium in shells and armor is also having the effect of low-level radioactive war both against one’s own troops and against the civilian population for long after a war has finished. Efforts to ban these weapons, often supported by prominent military figures, must be supported. The same goes for the weapons trade. The more people one sells weapons to, the more likely one is fomenting war. The U.S. is the largest dealer of arms–leading to its troops often facing weapons “made in the U.S.A.”

For more on this practice, see here, here, and here.