By Mary Beaudoin

Just when we believed that the terrible, grinding U.S./NATO proxy war in Ukraine was winding down, the Biden Administration surprised us with an escalation. On November 20, Ukraine fired six U.S. long-range ballistic missiles into Russia. These Made-in America weapons are called Army Tactical Missile Systems (their clever acronym, ATACMS, is pronounced “Attack ’em”, as though daring their use).

President Putin had warned in September that if NATO agreed to strikes deeper inside Russia, it’s at war. Russia revised its nuclear policy to say that even if non-nuclear states, when backed by nuclear states, fired long-range missiles inside Russia, it could trigger a nuclear response. Most people did not anticipate U.S./NATO taking the risk.

The expertise of U.S. personnel is required for the operation of ATACMS. The Washington Post reported that the U.S. and its European allies maintain the coordinates to fire them. Former UN Weapons Inspector Scott Ritter concludes, as Putin warned, that “the decision to allow Ukraine to use ATACMS missiles in Kursk leaves no doubt that the U.S. is a direct party to the invasion and occupation of Russian soil by NATO-proxy Ukrainian forces. In short, the U.S. is now at war with Russia.”

Joining the escalation, Ukraine fired a barrage of its British-French long range Storm Shadow/ SCALP cruise missiles striking inside Russia. Thus, both the U.S. and its NATO subordinates are directly involved in attacks within Russia.

Russia did not respond with nuclear weapons but had a surprise of its own — a new kind of fearsome intermediate-range missile (thankfully, not carrying nuclear weapons this time), the Oreshnik, which it tested by firing into Ukraine as a message.

With things escalating, we should not forget that in 2026, the U.S. already planned to have conventional intermediate-range missiles in Germany that could reach Russia. The U.S. also maintains, in five European countries, tactical weapons that it is currently modernizing. Political leaders have talked recklessly about the use of nuclear weapons, and the U.S. doesn’t have a No-First-Use nuclear policy, meaning it could make a pre-emptive nuclear attack.

Ritter and former CIA senior analyst Ray McGovern, along with another member of Veteran Intelligence Professionals for Sanity, Coleen Rowley, assert that we are now uniquely in danger of imminent nuclear war.

Our country is doubling down on hegemonic dominance through military might, in addition to economic muscle (sanctions) as its way of interacting in the world while power shifts to the Global South and begins to evade U.S. control. The U.S. approach of refusing to cooperate and share power in the world is disastrous, causing death and destruction wherever it goes. Not only did it sacrifice Ukraine by waging war, it failed in its strategic purpose of wearing down and weakening Russia, regarded as a competitor, and, as an unintended consequence, succeeded in wearing down and weakening European countries instead.

Within the U.S., hope lies in the power of people acting together. At this time, when it’s needed more than ever, we can build a broad anti-nuclear and peace movement. There is much to build on because people are aware of many issues and already have experience with action. Rallies to protect Native lands and immigrant rights persist. Systemic, racist police killings like George Floyd’s and the horror of genocide in Gaza awakened the conscience of the public. New energy comes from youth, students, and young families who have been raising their refreshing voices in the streets, on campuses, and in creative ways, joining long-time activists. Washington hawks say they are unduly influenced by Russian bots and Chinese TikTok. But what really worries the censurers is that these young people are seeing what systems of global domination and domestic oppression do and they want change.

⸺ Mary Beaudoin edits the newsletter for Women Against Military Madness, whose mission is to oppose U.S. militarism and involvement in wars.

By John LaForge

Giant military contractors might be just too big when their own weapons so overcrowd a war zone that their own missiles shoot down their own fighter jets.

This could be what happened in Ukraine in August, when a Lockheed Martin F-16 jet fighter, piloted by Ukrainian Lt. Col. Oleksiy Mes, was most likely shot down by a Patriot air-defense missile. Six of Lockheed Martin’s F-16s were delivered to Ukraine in August. An undisclosed number of Patriot missile systems arrived there earlier, from a General Dynamics program which was bought by Lockheed Martin in 1993.

The deputy head of the Ukrainian parliament’s defense committee, Mariana Bezuhla, made the allegation of so-called “friendly fire” and demanded consequences for parties responsible for the blunder. According to the Associated Press, Ukraine’s Air Force has not directly denied that the F-16 was hit by a Patriot missile. Four days after the crash President Zelenskyy fired the head of Ukraine’s Air Force, Lt. Gen. Mykola Oleshchuk, who had accused Bezuhla of illegally “discrediting U.S. arms manufacturers.” The gall!

Lockheed Martin is the $137-billion global weapons giant, with 115,000 employees, that sells — to willing buyers — anywhere all manner of war machines, from jet fighters to missiles, from helicopter gun systems, to rocket motors.

One Lockheed program making a real killing today is the F-35 jet fighter, now being sold all over the world.

Of course, Lockheed’s crash- and accident-prone F-35 is notoriously faulty. The jet’s 13 major crashes or disappearances over the last ten years hint at a shaky future performance in war. Lockheed Martin currently has around 100 F-35s in stock because they are not being delivered due to various technical problems and software modifications.

Lockheed boasts that by the 2030s, over 600 of its F-35s will be operating in ten European NATO states, the better to gear-up for permanent war with Russia.

Four NATO countries that now station U.S. hydrogen bombs at their air bases — Germany, Italy, Belgium, and Holland — are purchasing F-35s by the dozens.

The F-35s are being built to carry the Pentagon’s newest nuclear weapon, the B61-12 air-drop H-bomb. On March 8, 2024, the company declared the F-35A had officially been “certified” to carry the B61-12. These new thermonuclear weapons are set to be delivered to the allied NATO bases this year or in 2025, replacing the B61s already deployed there.

So, the Russians can sleep a little less easily as the newest U.S. fighter jets, carrying the newest U.S. air-drop nuclear bombs, will be ready and purposed for incinerating their cities on orders from the U.S. president. The F-35s are the first ever stealth (radar-evading) warplane certified to carry nuclear weapons.

Beyond the Pentagon’s “nuclear sharing” NATO partners, the F-35s are being peddled to other compliant militaries including those of Greece, Poland, Romania, Czech Republic, Singapore, South Korea, Israel, Australia, United Arab Emirates, Canada, and Japan.

With the Pentagon itself buying 1,855 F-35s, and nineteen other air forces in line for their share, a rough calculation is that Lockheed will sell 3,615 of the $110-million jets, pocketing at least $433 billion.

Starting last year, the U.S. deployed several of the nuclear-capable F-35s to the eastern borders of NATO, operating from Estonia, Lithuania, and Romania. The Royal Netherlands Air Force has trained to carry the U.S. B61 nuclear bombs for decades. Since the start of the Ukraine war, the Dutch have twice deployed their newly purchased F-35s in shows of force against Moscow, first to Poland which borders Russia, and later to Bulgaria.

In 2024, Lockheed Martin spent $6,434,005 on lobbying Congressional offices in Washington. On September 19, Lockheed sponsored the “Future of Defense Summit,” on Capitol Hill “to discuss how to build a more advanced defense industry and enhance deterrence.”

This bribery and lying in support of gargantuan military spending only leads to crimes of war or self-inflicted fatalities like Lockheed’s likely shoot-down of its own jet. Although it sells in Congress, Lockheed’s nuclear weapons systems and the means of delivering them are not for defense. They only produce billions in profits at the expense of the world’s crying need for basic necessities.

With the colossal volume of U.S.-made jets, tanks, bombs, missiles, helicopters, artillery, and intelligence programs being sold, traded, or gifted all over the world, it was inevitable that the empire’s guns would eventually be fired against itself — intentionally or by accident. If the Ukrainian F-16 crash and the death of Col. Mes is not to be repeated endlessly, and if accidental nuclear detonations are to be avoided, the United States will have to be forced to end its weaponization of international conflict, and to replace its militarized foreign policy with a diplomatic one.