We have military presence in a great many countries around the world supposedly for

This is extremely unwise and does not relate to the defense of our own country but rather to the promotion of other ideological objectives, which are in conflict with our national interests in many cases.

Example, in southern Africa, under a program called IMET we have been providing training to the military of the Angolan communist government, to the detriment of anti-Communist forces in that country.

Members of Congress from both political parties have been complicit in permitting our armed forces to be used in ways that are unconstitutional.

Overseas we now see NATO, the North Atlantic Treaty Organization, operating out of area. It was supposed to be a defensive alliance, but now it is an aggressive alliance carrying forward purposes which may be of interest to the member nations in Europe, but which do not relate to the proximate vital interests of the United States of America.

The Socialist International is the worldwide organization of socialist political parties. It used to be said that the Socialist International was like the Communist International, but without weapons. But now the Socialist International has weapons, the weapons of the United States of America. U.S military personnel have in essence become mercenaries for the Socialist International, insofar as the Socialist International now dominates NATO.

The Secretary General of NATO, Javier Solana is a former leader, along with Felipe Gonzalez, of the Socialist Workers Party of Spain. Gerhard Schroeder the Chancellor of Germany, is a Socialist International member, as is Tony Blair of the United Kingdom, Lionel Jospin the Prime Minister of France and others. In effect, Bill Clinton, who is at least a fellow traveler of the Socialist International, has cooperated by turning over our military personnel to them in Kosovo and elsewhere. This was done to advance not the interests of the United States, but the policy objectives of the Socialist International under the cover of what used to be an anti-Soviet alliance, NATO.

In light of this, there is no wise rationale for our continued membership in NATO. In the days when there was an immediate Soviet threat to the United States, some argued on pragmatic grounds that participation in NATO did serve our military interests. However, the situation is different today and one can well argue that NATO does disservice to those interests and that we are in effect providing cannon fodder for foreign governments in terms of human personnel and the depletion of our weapons resources through NATO.

The countries of Europe are capable of defending themselves. They're not about to be attacked by Communist China. They have the ability to defend themselves against the former Soviet Union, if that were to become a problem. But NATO membership requires that every member of NATO be prepared to go to war when any member of NATO comes under attack. Well, I don't want to see American lives lost if Romania and Hungary go to war over a territorial dispute. We should not be meddling in business that is not our own and it makes sense for us to promptly withdraw from NATO.

This is not a radical idea. Dwight Eisenhower when he was President operated under the assumption that NATO was a temporary alliance. Certainly no one at that time would have contemplated that 55 years after the end of World War II, we would still have American troops on the ground in Europe and still be devoting much of our defense spending to activities that do not relate to our defense. We do need to spend more money on defense for military pay. We do need to spend more money for Military equipment.

We do need to rebuild our navy, it's been cut from some 600 ships in the 1980's down to just about 300 ships today. We do need to spend money on things like a strategic defense against nuclear attack, various aircraft, and ground equipment. We need to replenish our supply of cruise missiles. But we don't need to spend our money keeping U.S. troops in Kosovo, Bosnia or any other places where they serve under UN or NATO auspices, under auspices that are irrelevant to our national defense.

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