"The flag follows the dollar and the soldiers follow the flag."
2007 Iowa PSR Billboard Project

How you can help About the billboard Impending war in Iran Who Dies? Who Pays? Who Profits? Who Decides? Take action, learn more Supporters listing Billboard locations

view larger image

---

Welcome to Iowa PSR’s new billboard project:  “Who Decides?”  Iowa PSR has contracted to erect six billboards in central and eastern Iowa.

---

Billboard Locations in Iowa (see details--exact locations & photos) Waterloo/Cedar Falls Dubuque Cedar Rapids Iowa City Quad Cities Des Moines

Warterloo Billboard 2/15/07

ABOUT THE BILLBOARD
  One of the first projects of the Iowa PSR Chapter  was to put up six billboards in Eastern and Central Iowa in November 2002 with the message:  “No War in Iraq.”  We were attempting to alert the public about the impending point of no return regarding invasion of Iraq.  The U.S. is now well beyond the point of no return and faces a dark future because of the war.

Our new project comes at the end of the fourth year of occupation in Iraq,

• after the death of  more than 3000 U.S. soldiers (30,000 severely wounded),
• the death of perhaps 650,000 Iraqi citizens [The Lancet 368:1421-28 (2006), free registration & login required] and more than 60,000 whose names and circumstances are precisely known,
• the expenditure already of  more than $368 billion in supplementary appropriations plus with an additional request for $235 billion requested for 2007 and 2008 and FY 2008 Budget Summary,
• no clear way ahead to an end of the carnage,
• and an impending preemptive attack on Iran.

One thing is clear, our generation has to face all over again the age-old questions regarding war:  “Who dies?”  “Who pays?”  “Who profits?” and  “Who decides?”  These are the questions posed by our new billboard project.

President Dwight D. Eisenhower’s Farewell Address delivered January 17, 1961 contains a carefully  measured exposition of central ideas behind the new billboard.  This was the speech that coined the term, “military-industrial complex.”

These ideas were developed and expanded by Dr. Arjun Makhijani with introduction of the term, “war system” that describes the modern root causes of war with global historical perspective by in the definitive 1992 essay “On Freedom and Equality.”  This essay was lauded by Daniel Ellsburg:

A vast number of words have been written about freedom. Both sides in countless struggles have appealed to it. If I had to pick one essay to inform action to resist the wars that are being waged in freedom's name, like the War on Terror today, I would pick this brilliant piece of work by Arjun Makhijani, whose work I have admired for many years. It is indispensable reading in the struggle for global democracy. -- Daniel Ellsburg

( back to top )

Perhaps the best raw expression of the ideas behind the new billboard come from one of the most highly decorated US Marines in history, General Smedly Butler.  We were reminded of General Butler by a U.S. Marine veteran of the Viet Nam War who read an excerpt from a 1933 speech given by General Butler during Iowa PSR’s March 2006 “Medical Consequences of War” conference in Iowa City:

I spent thirty- three years and four months in active military service as a member of this country's most agile military force, the Marine Corps. I served in all commissioned ranks from Second Lieutenant to Major-General. And during that period, I spent most of my time being a high class muscle- man for Big Business, for Wall Street and for the Bankers. In short, I was a racketeer, a gangster for capitalism.

I suspected I was just part of a racket at the time. Now I am sure of it. Like all the members of the military profession, I never had a thought of my own until I left the service. My mental faculties remained in suspended animation while I obeyed the orders of higher-ups. This is typical with everyone in the military service.

I helped make Mexico, especially Tampico, safe for American oil interests in 1914. I helped make Haiti and Cuba a decent place for the National City Bank boys to collect revenues in. I helped in the raping of half a dozen Central American republics for the benefits of Wall Street. The record of racketeering is long. I helped purify Nicaragua for the international banking house of Brown Brothers in 1909-1912 (where have I heard that name before?). I brought light to the Dominican Republic for American sugar interests in 1916. In China I helped to see to it that Standard Oil went its way unmolested.

During those years, I had, as the boys in the back room would say, a swell racket. Looking back on it, I feel that I could have given Al Capone a few hints. The best he could do was to operate his racket in three districts. I operated on three continents. -- Smedly Butler, 1933
 

The chapter titles of General Smedly’s book published in 1935, “War is a Racket,” help distill the ideas further:

1. War is a Racket
2. Who Makes the Profits?
3. Who Pays the Bills?
4. How to Smash this Racket!
5. To Hell with War!

Honestly, it did not take much imagination to bring these simple chapter titles to formulate a billboard message.

WAR IN IRAN??
While no resolution to the conflict in Iraq is apparent, the U.S. has embarked on the steps prerequisite to an attack on Iran.  National PSR will run an impressive ad the week of February 19, 2007 in the Congressional Quarterly (view ad).  The artwork for this ad is available for any groups who are interested in running it in Iowa newspapers or other venues.  Please contact us if you or your group is interested in running this ad locally.

WHO DIES?
In addition to combatants who die in war, the last century has ushered in an era of megadeath from war and the consequences of war.  Modern war casualties are predominantly civilians; and of civilians, women, children, and elders are the greatest victims.  Consider the ongoing poverty, suffering, illness, infant & childhood mortality, and premature death that follows for decades and generations after the destruction of a infrastructure, especially health care infrastructure, of a country.

WHO PAYS?
Taxpayers foot the bill.  Our grandchildren will be paying the interest on war debts incurred now [See Charts of Proposed 2008 Budget, especially interest payments on page 8.]  Current estimates are that for every U.S. combatant death 16 are seriously wounded.  War veterans require ongoing health care with problems out of proportion to age matched cohorts.  Psychiatric problems including Post Traumatic Stress Disorder, alcoholism, domestic violence, divorce, and homelessness disproportionately afflict veterans.  Estimates of the lifetime costs of providing health care for veterans are rapidly growing (see a 2005 Congressional Budget Office report).  According to a Reuters Foundation report the cost of health care for Afghan and Iraq War veterans over the next 40 years will between $350 and $662 billion.  The loss and grief of surviving families is incalculable.  Workers in the armament industries are exposed to toxics and the military one of the greatest single polluters of the environment whether we are at war or not.

WHO PROFITS?
We have been amply warned about the military-industrial complex.  We are now, no doubt, embedded in an ongoing sequence escalating resource wars.  The slogan "blood for oil" rings true.  The profits for petroleum corporations set all-time records in 2006.  Individual transnational corporations have grown more wealthy and powerful than most individual countries.  Military force is needed to project the interest of the largest corporate interests.  General Smedly Butler's observation that the flag follows the dollar and the soldier follows the flag is still apt.

WHO DECIDES?
The people?  The Congress?  The President?  International Law?  The United Nations?  Corporations?  Who should decide?  Perhaps mothers would be the best deciders.  This may be a good time to recall Julia Ward Howe's Mother Day Proclamation of 1870 that helped cause Mother's Day to be celebrated in the U.S.:

1.  Contact your elected representatives and let them know what you think.  See our page on
           detailed representative contact information.

2.  National PSR Resolution "Opposition to the Continuation of the War in Iraq"

3.  PSR's position on Iraq War escalation
4.  Send a message about the Iraq War troop surge from the national PSR web site

5.  Besides supporting this Billboard Project consider getting a group together to run the new PSR

6.  Films:

Why We Fight:  http://www.sonyclassics.com/whywefight/main.html

The Corporation:  http://www.thecorporation.com/

BILLBOARD SUPPORTERS

    Elizabeth Constantine, Iowa City
    Charlie Day, PhD, Des Moines
    David Drake DO, Des Moines
    Marybeth Gardam, Des Moines
    Susan Goodner, MD, Iowa City
    Andrew Kanter MD MPH, Chicago
    Diane Krell, Des Moines
    Karen Kubby, Iowa City
    Howard Lord, Montezuma
    Arnold Lindaman, Coralville
    Maureen McCue MD PhD, Oxford
    Michelle Mouton, Mount Vernon
    Dee & Carrie Norton, Iowa City
    John Olds MD, Des Moines
    Ted Pfeiff, LeClaire
    September 2006 Iowa City Peace Fair cash donations
    John Shumaker, Cedar Rapids
    John Rachow PhD MD, Oxford
    Robert Schultes MD, Cedar Rapids
    Maria Valenti, PSR Boston
    Rajeev Vibhakar MD, Iowa City
    Women for Peace, Cedar Rapids

BILLBOARD EXACT LOCATIONS

Waterloo University Ave at Falls Ave.
Dubuque 8th and Hill St.
Cedar Rapids 1271 1st Ave SE across from Coe College above Brewed Awakenings.
Iowa City  1/2 block south of S Gilbert and Kirkwood, across from Aero Rental.
Quad Cities 6200 State St in Bettendorf.
Des Moines 63rd & Army Post Rd.