MILITARY EXPENDITURES: "IN OUR SCHOOLS THERE ARE NO TEXTBOOKS, PLEASE PAY THE TAXES... ". HOW DO YOU THINK, WHAT WILL BE BOUGHT FOR OUR TAXES, TEXTBOOKS REALLY?

Statement of Nikolaj Khramov, secretary of the Antimilitarist Radical Association.

Moscow, December 21, 1998. ``Last days we see on TV a tearful spot: "In our schools there are no textbooks: please pay your taxes. Federal Tax Police Service". This spot is being broadcasted just after news releases, which informs about vain attempts of General Staff to put in battle readiness the Pacific Fleet in relation with the British-American action in Iraq. The draft budget for 1999 is submitted to the State Duma. With optimism, bordering with idiotism, this draft incorporates already the IMF credits. The military expenditures in this budget consist 33%. Red-brown Saddam's friends in Okhotny Ryad shout unanimously: "Give more!". The expenditures for education form in the same budget half-percent. We are being admonished (by threats if not by caress) to pay the taxes for filling this budget. How do you think, what will be bought on these taxes? Really textbooks? Do not consider Russian citizens as idiots!''