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Statement of Purpose

Painting of a dove The Maine Peace Action Committee (MPAC) was founded in 1974 with a special focus on ending the war in Indochina. MPAC has been concerned with our society's violent and militaristic nature, which is manifested in a lack of humane and progressive values and a tendency towards solving problems via destructive means.

Our general orientation takes the double focus of analyzing and opposing militarism, or the efforts to use nuclear weapons and other military means to solve human problems, and imperialism, or the efforts by powerful nations to use economic and military means to impose their will upon less powerful peoples.

Our nation's pursuit of these policies undermines its ability to deal with the needs of its own citizens and places us in greater danger of war. Our tax dollars are used to develop first strike capable weapons and to support repressive regimes abroad. Consequently, there are fewer dollars available for needed human services both here and abroad.

If we direct our energy and other resources into weapons systems, there is little left for creative solutions to problems such as the world food and fuel shortages which threaten our survival.

We have seen human needs are neglected by an existing government, and when that government represses groups attempting to meet those needs, violent upheaval has resulted. Our government's military economic support for such repressive regimes has embroiled us in armed conflicts which have escalated to full scale war and could mean inevitable global destruction.

We support efforts to deal with each of these problems since we see them as resulting and contributing to an economic and political system over which most of us have little control.

We, in MPAC, believe that while none of these efforts by itself can bring about a completely just society, together we can work toward more comprehensive solutions. We feel that we can best contribute by challenging militarism and imperialism and proposing alternatives to these policies. We find we can act effectively if we focus on a limited number of specific issues and campaigns. We need projects which can:

unite people within our group;
provide opportunities for action resulting in measurable achievement;
link our efforts with national campaigns; and
demonstrate the dynamics of militarism and imperialism.

For our activities to be successful, we need to educate ourselves about issues, analyze the contributing factors, investigate alternative solutions, decide strategy for implementing alternatives, and share our understanding with the community to enlist their support.

MPAC believes that people united and working together can redefine our values and change our approach to problems so that we shall be able to live in a free and creative society; indeed, such efforts are imperative if we are to survive.