Written by David Starr   

John "Bombs Away!" McCain is the prototype of the gung-ho, imperial war monger. He is fetishistic about war. Whether dealing with Iran, Syria, Russia or Ukraine, McCain salivates as a sabre-rattler.

McCain wants the United States to get more involved in the Ukraine. Having rubbed elbows with its neo-fascist rulers, McCain wants weapons sent to Ukrainian forces and threatens Russia's President Vladimir Putin with imperial war. McCain also wants military intervention in Syria to support the "Free Syrian Army." And McCain isn't in the mood to have dialogue with Iran, wanting military action against it.

On these "fronts," McCain has chided U.S. President Barack Obama for not accepting McCain's "final solutions." "This is more of the same old, same old from ultra-hawk McCain," writes Justin Baragona in Politicus (4/22/2014). "Whatever POTUS decides, McCain has to make the talk show rounds and point out how wrong Obama is."

In the Daily Banter (6/03/2013), Ben Cohen makes eight points to show that McCain is "an unhinged warmonger":

"1) McCain is trying to up American involvement in the civil war raging in Syria. Apparently not bothered by the disasters of U.S. involvement in Iraq and Afghanistan, and the raging anti-Americanism in the Middle East, McCain thinks more involvement will improve the situation. Or maybe he doesn't care about that either, and just wants more war.

2) He helped the Bush Administration build a case for war in Iraq, despite any evidence of WMDs or Saddam's links to Al-Qaeda, building a fictitious case against Saddam that led to one of the greatest strategic disasters in U.S. military history.

3) Unwilling to accept that America's role in Iraq was increasingly pointless, McCain was a huge supporter of 'the surge' in 2007.

4) McCain believes in America's divine right to occupy a country for as long as it likes in order to achieve its objectives. [He favored occupying Iraq for 100 years.]

5) McCain has long been a proponent of attacking Iran, being 'a) fabulously uninformed and b) dangerously bellicose' [quoting Joe Klein].

6) Regardless of its illegality, McCain has advocated bombing the infrastructure of enemy countries. Under Article 54 of Protocol I of the 1977 Geneva Conventions, it is prohibited to attack, destroy, remove or render useless objects indispensable to the survival of the civilian population.

7) McCain doesn't believe in torture unless the CIA does it.

8) There is good evidence to believe that John McCain's thirst for war is almost entirely down to political ambition."

McCain's service in Vietnam earned him numerous awards and citations. But the "war hero," before being captured, "spent his 22 missions bombing mostly civilian targets in North Vietnam," according to Phillip Gerardi in a Global Research article (6/01/2013). (Gerardi's article also asserts that McCain was possibly a collaborator for the North Vietnamese, getting preferential treatment for his information. Alexander Cockburn also provides details in Counterpunch, 4/19/2008.)

It is high time that U.S. citizens stop supporting imperial war. And that means not supporting John McCain and other warmongers.

David Starr writes on various issues, both national and international