Friday:
3:00 – 5:00 PM — Peaceful Anti-U.S. Foreign Military Bases Rally
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5:00 – 7:00 PM — Dinner on your own
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7:00 – 10:00 PM — Public Meeting: International Night
U.S. Foreign Policy and the Strategic Role of Foreign Military Bases
Chair: Leah Bolger
Local Welcoming Remarks: The Rev. C. D. Witherspoon, The Peoples Power Assembly, Baltimore
Opening Remarks: Alfred L. Marder, President, U.S. Peace Council
Keynote Speakers:
— Ajamu Baraka, National Organizer, Black Alliance for Peace
— Ann Wright, Leading Member of Veterans For Peace and CODEPINK
International Speakers:
— Rabindra Adhikari, Member of the Secretariat, World
Peace Council
— Miguel Figueroa, President, Canadian Peace Congress
— John Lannon, Member of the Executive of PANA (Peace and Neutrality Alliance); Founding Member of Shannonwatch, Ireland
— Elsa Rassbach, Member of Coordination Committee, Stop Air Base Ramstein
Cultural Presentation
Saturday:
9:00 – 10:00 AM — Opening Session
History and Economic Costs of U.S. Foreign Military Bases
Chair: Leah Bolger
Keynote Speaker:
— David Vine, Author of Base Nation: How U.S. Military Bases Overseas Harm America and the World
10:15 – 11:45 AM — Plenary 1: The Environmental and Health Impact of U.S. Foreign Military Bases
Chair: Nancy Price
Speakers:
— Patricia Hynes, Chair, Board of the Traprock Center for Peace and Justice
— Susan Schnall, Co-Coordinator, Vietnam Agent Orange Relief and Responsibility Campaign
— Pat Elder, Member, Coordinating Committee, World Beyond War
— Marie Cruz, New York Solidarity with Vieques; Instructor at Gallatin School of Individualized Study
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11:45 AM – 12:30 PM: Lunch
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12:30 – 2:00 PM: Plenary 2: South America / Guantanamo
Chair: David Swanson
Speakers:
— James Patrick Jordan, Co-Coordinator, Alliance for Global Justice
— Berta Joubert-Ceci, Women’s International Democratic Federation
— Cheryl LaBash, Co-Chair, National Network on Cuba
2:15 – 3:45 PM — Plenary 3: Asia Pacific / Pivot to Asia
Chair: Bruce Gagnon
Speakers:
— Bernadette Ellorin, Chairperson, BAYAN USA
— Will Griffin, Member of Board of Directors, Veterans For Peace
— Hyun Lee, Task Force to Stop THAAD in Korea and Militarism in Asia and the Pacific
4:00 – 5:30 PM — Plenary 4: The Middle East: U.S./NATO Plan
Chair: Henry Lowendorf
Speakers:
— Matthew Hoh, Senior Fellow, Center for International Policy
— Sara Flounders, Co-Director, International Action Center
— Bahman Azad, Organizational Secretary, U.S. Peace Council
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5:30 – 7:00 PM — Dinner on your own
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7:00 – 9:00 PM: Cultural Event
Sunday:
10:00 – 11:30 AM — Plenary 5: Europe / Expansion of NATO
Chair: Ana Rebrii
Speakers:
— Phil Wilayto, Editor, The Virginia Defender
— Ray McGovern, Former CIA Analyst; Founder, Veteran Intelligence Professionals for Sanity
— John Lannon, PANA, Shannonwatch, Ireland
11:45 AM – 1:15 PM — Plenary 6: AFRICOM / Invasion of Africa
Chair: Ajamu Baraka
Speakers:
— Margaret Kimberley, Editor, Black Agenda Report
— Maurice Carney, Executive Director, Firends of the Congo
— Netfa Freeman, Organizer, Pan African Community Action (PACA)
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1:15 – 2:00 PM: Lunch
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2:00 –3:30 PM — Plenary 7: Coalition’s Future Plan of Action
Chair: Joe Lombardo
— February 23rd – Guantanamo Anniversary Protest
— International Conference Against U.S. Foreign Military Bases
— Planning other actions for the coming year
3:45 – 4:30 PM — Closing Remarks
Eliminating the 800+ foreign bases is not the total equivalent of eliminating the Empire, but it is the most analogous thing (and the easiest to understand aspect) to eliminating the overseas nature of this Empire.
Congratulations on your focusing on this highly visible aspect of all past Empires — and our currently unique disguised global capitalist Empire
Of course the domestic crimes of this first in human history; ‘effectively-Disguised’, ‘truly-Global’, and crony ‘Capitalist-fueled’ EMPIRE within America (the metropole of the Empire) would not be perceived by most of ‘we the American people’, as being connected to expunging or ‘excising’ the cancer of the overseas Empire.
So my heartfelt recommendation to your excellent “Conference on U.S. Foreign Military Bases” would be that you both simplify, integrate, educate, and combine your efforts against Foreign Military Bases into a broader diagnosis of the cancer of EMPIRE — which is the proximate and seminal meta-cause of both EMPIRE abroad AND the partially disgusied nature of the very same EMPIRE ‘at home’, as Hannah Arendt warned her own German people about when she said:
“Empire abroad entails tyranny at home”.
The American people — both the ‘informed/progressive/anti-war’ leading cohort you intend to address at your conference, AND the somewhat ‘lower-information’ 3% to 5% that you will need to ignite an effective Second American people’s patriotic peaceful “Political/economic and socialist Revolution Against Empire” [Justin du Rivage] — will far more readily recognize, understand, and organize to address the overall disease of EMPIRE (akin to the First, and only successful, American “Revolution Against Empire”) than will people only focusing on the foreign aspects of this Disguised Global Capitalist EMPIRE, which is only nominally HQed in, and merely ‘poses’ as, our former country.
Just sayin’
“As Zygmunt Bauman hauntingly puts it, “In the case of an ailing social order, the absence of an adequate diagnosis … is a crucial, perhaps decisive, part of the disease.”13
Berman, Morris (2011-02-07). Dark Ages America: The Final Phase of Empire (p. 22). Norton. Kindle Edition.
Thanks for your willingness to consider such a strategic approach and a strategic narrative focused on educating and organizing against the entire Empire and not just the foreign base sector of Empire.
Liberty, democracy, justice, and equality
Over
Violent (and dual-party Vichy disguised)
Empire,
Alan MacDonald
Wells, Maine
There is so much that I need to learn at the conference. I am excited about coming to Baltimore. John Spitzberg, VFP, Chapters 099/160, Willow, Alaska
I endorse and support this conference, from Europe.
Unfortunately, it’s too far to come, but you guys have my and my Organization’s support!
http://www.freesuriyah.eu
http://www.stopdebezetting.org
Chairman Sonja van den Ende
if this country would close ALL its military bases in the world and cut military spending by half we would have free healthcare and education and no more homeless. An perhaps we might not have a nuclear holocaust (or at least postpone it!!)
we not need war`s and mass dest, we need exploring, jobs,live, progress and understanding each other … hugz for all.