- Critics of the US war machine frequently cite U.S. President
Dwight Eisenhower's seminal speech in which he uncannily predicted the
threat the "US military industrial complex" would pose to America
and the world.
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- In 1961, Eisenhower, a retired U.S. Army general who
led the allied invasion of Germany in WWII, uttered these prescient words,
" . . . In the councils of government, we must guard against the acquisition
of unwarranted influence, whether sought or unsought, by the military industrial
complex. The potential for the disastrous rise of misplaced power exists
and will persist. We must never let the weight of this combination endanger
our liberties or democratic processes. We should take nothing for granted.
Only an alert and knowledgeable citizenry can compel the proper meshing
of the huge industrial and military machinery of defense with our peaceful
methods and goals, so that security and liberty may prosper together .
. ."
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- If only the citizenry had listened.
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- Eisenhower's feared military industrial complex has been
swept aside by the U.S. War Corporation. It took just 42 years for the
War Corporation to eliminate the dividing line between the U.S. military
and U.S. industry and eradicate the troublesome provisions of Posse Comitatus-an
1878 law that forbids military involvement in most domestic affairs, including
law enforcement. The War Corporation has its tentacles in every element
of the American political, military, economic and cultural milieu, and
it affects the lives of every citizen in every country on the planet. It
operates in the heavens, has claimed the Earth's moon and, perhaps, through
the U.S. Air Force's Planetary Defense operation, has some Strangelovian
designs for Mars.
-
- The United States of America has been at war with the
world since Eisenhower made his remarks 42 years ago. From 1961 to 2002,
the War Corporation has fueled the fires of death and destruction in every
corner of the globe in order to make the world safe-for-profit, using the
clever ruses of freedom and democracy. The evidence is astounding and sickening:
the Cold War, the Vietnam War, the bombing of Libya, the indiscriminant
offshore shelling of Lebanon by U.S. battleships, the invasion of Grenada,
the invasion of Panama, the Persian Gulf War, daily bombings of Iraq in
the "no fly zone," ill-conceived military interventions into
Somalia and Haiti, cruise missile attacks on Afghanistan and innocents
in Sudan, U.S. state-sponsored assassinations in Chile, Nicaragua, El Salvador,
Congo, Rwanda, Brazil, Colombia, a likely resumption of nuclear testing,
and, finally, the War in Afghanistan and the War on Terrorism.
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- To make some interventions more palatable to the public,
the Pentagon devised Orwellian-sounding code names to convey "good
intentions"-Operations Provide Comfort (Kurdistan), Noble Eagle (the
War on Terrorism), Enduring Freedom (War in Afghanistan), Restore Hope
(Somalia), Just Cause (Panama), Uphold Democracy (Haiti), Guardian Retrieval
(Zaire), Shepherd Venture (Guinea-Bissau), Noble Response (Kenya), and
one that could have only been devised by a military Freemason with entirely
too much time on his hands, Noble Obelisk (Sierra Leone).
-
- How many wars will a society tolerate until it says no
more?
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- Arms for All
-
- Consider the despicable global arms trade in which the
U.S. dominates. The U.S. will sell weapons, gear and training to all comers
with cash or a country with exploitable geography and resources. The U.S.
War Corporation counts as its clients Chad, with an annual per capita income
of $230, and Kenya, whose law enforcement is skilled at "common methods
of torture . . . including hanging persons upside down for long periods,
genital mutilation, electric shocks, and deprivation of air by submersion
of the head in water," according to the Council for a Livable World
(CLW). Despite all this, the American citizenry refuses to heed Eisenhower's
warning and has taken its liberty "for granted," placing its
trust in U.S. officials who see "evil" and threats in every corner.
-
- For this ignorance-of-the-damned, the American people
have now brought upon themselves the militarization of American society
that Eisenhower so feared, and that Herbert Marcuse so eloquently described
in One Dimensional Man. The American people are routinely psyop'ed by the
War Corporation into an "us-versus-them" mentality; we're right,
your wrong-no argument allowed. Is it any surprise that a less enlightened
retired U.S. Army general, Colin Powell, recently admitted that the War
on Terrorism will never end "in our lifetime"? Today, sadly,
the U.S. War Corporation has taken almost complete control of America and
has marshaled its entire war machinery against approximately 33 foreign
terrorist groups, numbering perhaps 5,000 to 8,000 individuals who are
mostly impoverished and oppressed by ruthless regimes who retaliate with
the armaments, strategies and tactics purchased from the U.S. War Corporation.
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- GlobalIssues.org reports that close to $1 trillion dollars
is spent on worldwide military expenditures and the international weapons
trade. They rightly point out that globalization has caused weapons makers
to take a globalization and porous border approach to selling weapons.
In the words of one U.S. "defense" contractor, "We have
no allegiance, this is a business and we sell to whatever country can afford
them." The CLW's research indicates that U.S. military spending comprises
over half (53 percent) of total discretionary spending ($755 billion),
an increase from 48 percent in fiscal year 2001. The proposed military
budget of $396.1 billion is 15 percent higher than the average Cold War
budget, even in today's dollars. CLW reports that from 1946 to 1989 the
U.S. budget authority for defense was an average of $343 billion a year
(fiscal year 2003 dollars). In terms of outlays, according to the Senate
Budget Committee minority staff, the proposed spending in fiscal year 2003
exceeds the Cold War average by $44 billion. How much money is enough?
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- Forget the Poor
-
- Just a fraction of what is spent on defense might-probably
would-eliminate many of the conditions that breed terrorists in today's
world. Oscar Arias Sanchez, the 1987 Nobel Peace Prize winner and former
President of Costa Rica declared, "The world's priorities are wrong.
With just a small amount of what the world spends on defense, we could
address poverty, inequality, illiteracy, disease, environmental degradation,
and drought."
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- In 2002, the War Corporation's "center-of-gravity
or nexus of operations," as it is known in war-speak, is in the Washington,
D.C., metro region and includes the U.S. presidency and U.S. Congress,
uniformed and non-uniformed war contractors (to include the four military
branches, weapons manufacturers and mercenaries), war intelligence agencies,
various war departments operating under Zemyatinesqe names like the Department
of Defense, Department of State, Department of Justice, and President of
the United States. Even toy companies and bubble gum trading card companies
are in on the war gig. And why not? It is the number one business in America.
For just $45 American children can have their very own "Tora Bora
Ted, Swift Freedom Delta Force Night OPS" action figure to replace
GI Joe. Operation Enduring Freedom bubble gum cards are also on the streets.
No, not even children are spared the insanity of the War Corporation's
propaganda.
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- A major U.S. War Corporation bureau of information-NBC
News-is owned by major weapons contractor General Electric, which runs
advertisements extolling the virtues of its global reach. According to
globalissues.org, America's leading weapons maker, Lockheed Martin, ran
an advertisement claiming "the perception of peace means less jobs
for Americans." But the Turks build F16s, not Americans. Another Lockheed
Martin propaganda piece claimed the F-22 was an antiwar plane. Many advertisements
run on all the major networks emphasized that a better fighter plane would
ensure loved ones can come back home. The U.S. Congress buys these claims,
in the fishing metaphor, hook-line- and sinker. Between 1990 and 2002,
opensecrets.org reports that the U.S. War Corporation weapons makers contributed
more than $67 million to the U.S. Congress to protect their global interests.
In one of the more crass instances of U.S. "defense" contractor
lobbying, the weapons contractors defeated a U.S. congressional resolution
recognizing Turkey's culpability in the Armenian genocide in 1919. The
reason? Turkey threatened to cancel U.S. military contracts.
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- The War Corporation influences politics and economics
in every state of the American Union and as far away as provinces in China,
on the sparsely populated Cook Islands in the South Pacific, and in more
familiar places like Nicaragua, where it recently fixed the outcome of
a national election, and Colombia, where the U.S. War Corporation helped
assassinate a Catholic bishop opposed to the U.S. puppet regime there.
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- Profiting From Middle East Bloodshed
-
- Perhaps nowhere is the War Corporation's influence seen
more vividly than in the current turmoil in the Middle East. The U.S. Department
of State is completely militarized under the regime of Colin Powell-who
helped whitewash the My Lai Massacre in Vietnam, his deputy Richard Armitage-a
former U.S. Special Forces and CIA dirty tricks operator in Southeast Asia,
and Middle East Special Envoy retired US Marine Corps General and American
proconsul Anthony Zinni. These so-called "diplomats" are the
major U.S. players ostensibly responsible for bringing "peace"
to the region. But as Robin Wright, a respected Middle East expert, pointed
out in her column in the Los Angeles Times on March 31, 2002, even Kuwait
has had enough of U.S. duplicity in the region.
-
- "11 years after Kuwait was freed, about 4,000 demonstrators
rallied at Flag Square in Kuwait City to denounce Israel and the United
States. With the speaker of the Kuwaiti parliament and other top ministers
present, the crowd shouted, "No god but Allah! America enemy of Allah!"
and "Muslims, Muslims unite! Death to Israel, death to America!"
the Reuters news agency reported.
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- In a reflection of shifting sentiments over the last
18 months, since the latest Palestinian Intifada began, the crowd also
roared, "America and Zionism are against the Muslim nation!"
Rallying on behalf of the Palestinians and against the United States is
particularly ironic because the Palestinians sided with Iraq, not the Kuwaiti
monarchy, during the 1991 Persian Gulf War." But that's of little
consequence to the U.S. War Corporation.
-
- Most Middle East analysts, from ex-Reagan administration
department heads to former President Jimmy Carter-experts who have traditionally
remained committed to even-handedness in their commentaries-are blaming
the Bush administration, and primarily the State Department, for allowing
events to explode out of control in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. There
should be little wonder why the U.S. chose passive disengagement over active
engagement. After all, as Israel commits more occupying troops to the West
Bank and Gaza, they will require more U.S. weaponry-tanks, armored personnel
carriers, artillery, and consultants from the likes of MPRI and Dyncorp.
And who will profit from prolonging bloodshed in the Middle East? The U.S.
War Corporation and its surrogates.
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- In the fiscal year 2002 budget, Israel was allotted $2.04
billion in U.S. military aid. Under a memorandum of understanding signed
between the U.S. and Israel on January 19, 2001, just a day before Bush's
appointment to the US presidency, U.S. military aid to Israel will likely
grow to $2.4 billion by 2008. As Israel's right-wing militaristic government
continues to flex its muscles, its Arab neighbors will increase their own
military stockpiles. Three of them-Egypt, Jordan, and Saudi Arabia-are
among the largest recipients of U.S. military weaponry. From 1999 to 2000,
Egypt received $1.3 billion in U.S. military aid and Jordan got $123 million.
While Saudi Arabia receives no outright U.S. military assistance, it has
bought over $33.5 billion of the most sophisticated U.S. weapons systems
(AWACS, F-15's and more) over the past 10 years. That's more than U.S.
military assistance given to Israel and Egypt combined.
-
- Among the most vociferous propagandists of the Bush administration's
ratcheting up of Middle East tensions, ludicrous military spending, and
U.S. takeover of the Persian Gulf and Middle East are retired U.S. military
generals whose telephone numbers cram every cable and non-cable network
producers' Rolodex. The current crop of Pentagon generals and admirals
unknowingly betray a long tradition of senior U.S. military officers refraining
from political activity. Generals William Tecumseh Sherman and George Marshall
refrained from voting, reflecting their desire for political neutrality
among the officer corps. But that is of no consequence to the troupe of
military officers who mock Dwight Eisenhower.
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- Weapons Everyone, Weapons!
-
- According to a Congressional Research Service study,
Conventional Arms Transfers to Developing Nations, poor countries bought
68 percent of U.S. weapons output. American weapons producers signed contracts
for some $18.6 billion dollars in 2000, up from around $12.9 billion dollars
the previous year. U.S. contracts accounted for 49.7 percent of global
sales in 2000 and the U.S. controlled half of the developing world's arms
market with $12.6 billion in sales. CLW commented that "this dominance
of the global arms market is not something in which the American public
or policy makers should applaud. The U.S. routinely sells weapons to undemocratic
regimes and gross human rights abusers." That list of countries includes
those that Americans believe are trustworthy allies. These include Saudi
Arabia, Indonesia, Pakistan, Kuwait, Turkmenistan and Turkey.
-
- Meanwhile, back in the United States, War Corporation
member, Joint Strike Fighter winner and largest weapons producer-Lockheed
Martin-is busy behind the scenes operating home mortgage tracking databases
for the Department of Housing and Urban Development and providing state
and local law enforcement and correctional facilities with an "Integrated
Justice Information System," a platform which "integrates and
modernize systems for law enforcement, courts, and corrections." Why
do they need that business? The rationale behind the "commercial"
ventures, and for those of every weapons contractor, is to make sure that
enough profit is made courtesy of public largesse to keep weapons production
lines open.
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- While Lockheed Martin personnel are hailed as "heroes,"
few know that Lockheed's mixed history includes bribing Japanese government
officials in 1976. That action led fellow War Corporation member, the U.S.
Congress, to pass the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act in 1977. And as of
2000, Lockheed Martin and the majority of U.S. weapons manufacturers refused
to renounce production of landmines and their deployment along the Korean
demilitarized zone and other killing fields in Africa and South Asia.
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- Landmines
-
- On that cheery note, the International Campaign to Ban
Landmines reports that the U.S. government admantly refuses to ban or place
a moratorium on the production of antipersonnel mines. According to the
United States Campaign to Ban Landmines, those devices kill 18,000 people
a year, most of them civilians. The stockpile cap announced on January
17, 1997, does not preclude the production of new antipersonnel mines to
replace those used in future combat operations. Former US Army Lt. Gen.
Hal Moore, who was recently portrayed by Mel Gibson in the movie When We
Were Soldiers, in a letter to President Bush, stated, "landmines pose
a particularly grave threat to refugees and the internally displaced as
they seek to return home and rebuild their lives." He and other retired
military veterans urged Bush to sign the international Mine Ban Treaty
in a March 12, 2002, letter.
-
- Yet, the U.S. War Corporation ignores their pleas. The
U.S. is currently producing M87A1 Volcano mine canisters containing antivehicle
mines at the Lone Star Army Ammunition Plant in Texarkana, Texas. This
is a government-owned facility operated by War Corporate member Day and
Zimmerman. Although the production of these mines is scheduled to end next
November, the death and mayhem caused by these inhuman weapons have already
been dealt.
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- In the end, the worst hit are the young people of the
world. Because many anti-personnel mines look like toys, children have
been attracted to them, with many losing their arms, legs, and eyesight,
if not their lives. But there can never be too many weapons. The problem
of overproduction was solved by George Orwell's "Oceania" in
1984: "As for the problem of overproduction . . . it is solved by
the device of continuous warfare, which is also useful in keying up public
morale to the necessary pitch."
-
- Dwight Eisenhower, igonored by the U.S. War Corporation
in his post-presidency, uttered words seemingly too lofty for the current
generation of war mongers to understand: " . . . Disarmament, with
mutual honor and confidence, is a continuing imperative. Together we must
learn how to compose differences, not with arms, but with intellect and
decent purpose. Because this need is so sharp and apparent I confess that
I lay down my official responsibilities in this field with a definite sense
of disappointment. As one who has witnessed the horror and the lingering
sadness of war-as one who knows that another war could utterly destroy
this civilization which has been so slowly and painfully built over thousands
of years-I wish I could say tonight that a lasting peace is in sight."
___
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- John Stanton is a Virginia-based writer on national security
affairs and Wayne Madsen is a Washington, DC-based investigative journalist
who writes and comments frequently on civil liberties and human rights
issues.
-
- The views expressed herein are the writers' own and do
not necessarily reflect those of Online Journal. Email editor@onlinejournal.com
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