KURTENBACH: Guns and the weapons of War

[Oscar]

Guns and the weapons of War

September 15, 2015

To the Editor,

Eve Marriam, an American writer, poet and lecturer died in 1922. She once made this gem of a statement: I dream of giving birth to a child who will ask, " Mother, what was war?"

Every day now, our TV screens show us a myriad of pictures of thousands of men, women, children and babies, including elderly people, leaving Syria, Iraq and Afghanistan in their endeavour to find a place away from war and killing, hoping to become citizens in a peaceful country where their families are not subjected to losing their lives in what appears to be stupid and unending wars in the Middle East.

One has to wonder who are the people or their political leaders who believe that in order to attain peace, you have to kill or disable those with whom you disagree. Obviously, these are people who have psychopathic tendencies and may believe in the "glory of war".

And then, of course, we have the global manufacturers of the weapons of war [including Canada] now planning to increase the manufacture and export of arms to provide more jobs.

We, the human beings of our planet, have managed to assemble an astronomical number of guns and weapons. A Small Arms Survey has estimated that presently there are about 875 million small arms in worldwide circulation, produced by 1000 companies in 100 countries. The Stockholm International Peace Research Institute [SIPRI] lists total global military expenditures in 2012 at $1.756 trillion.

The USA has by far the greatest military investments, with Russia and China together spending about a half of the American amount. The remainder of the military spending is accounted for by Saudi Arabia, France and other countries.

Just imagine what that kind of money could do if it were used for health and education and the poor and oppressed on our planet.

Perhaps our contemporary Pope Francis would make a statement that war is anti-Christian. I rather believe that would be okay with Jesus.

Leo Kurtenbach,
Saskatoon, SK
Phone 306 652 5129