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April 1, 2002
Phyllis Pollack
The Making of Exile
on Main Street
Dave Marsh
DeskScan:
This Week's
Top 10 CDs
Francis Boyle
The Big Lie:
Palestine, Palestinians
and International Law
March 31, 2002
Jordan
Flaherty
Last
Night the Israeli
Military Tried to Kill Me
Kristen Schurr
Live from Bethlehem
Maha Sbitani
The
Israeli Army Took Over My House
Robert Fisk
Lies Leaders Tell When
They Want to Go to War
March 24/30, 2002
Alexander Cockburn
The Year
of the Yellow Notepad:
Plagiarism and History
Rep. Ron Paul
Slavery and the Draft
Fidel
Castro
A
Better World is Possible
Edward Said
What Price Oslo?
José
Saramago
Justice
and Democracy Denied
Azmi Bishara
Talking to Tanks
Jeffrey
St. Clair
Clearcutting
Montana
Alexander Cockburn
50 Years of James Bond
Wilhelm
Reich
Gethsemane
Claud Cockburn
The Horror of It All
Dave Marsh
What's
Playing at My Houe
David Vest
Remembering Tammy Wynette
Jeffrey
St. Clair
Waylon
Jennings:
an Honest Outlaw
March 23, 2002
Mokhiber/Weissman
A
Corporate Lawyer
Speaks Out
Saeed Vaseghi
The US and Iran's Quest
for Democracy
Brian
J. Foley
Does
Pedophilia Scandal Spell an Opportunity for Catholics?
Sheperd Bliss
American Soul and Empire
James
Packard Winkler
Occupation
and Terror:
Politics from a Gun Barrel
M. Shahid Alam
A New International Division
of Labor
T.W. Croft
Enron's
Attack on Our
Economic Security
March 22, 2002
Robert Jensen
Corporate Power is a
Threat to Democracy
Tommy
Ates
The
Future of Black Academia
Rep. Ron Paul
Why are We in Ukraine?
March 21, 2002
McQuinn,
Munson, & Wheeler
Stars
and Stripes:
Killing for the Flag?
John Chuckman
How Change is Wrought
David
Vest
Hail
to the Chaff
March 20, 2002
Kay Lee
Censorship at Angelfire
Robert
Jensen
The
Politics of Pain
and Pleasure
Sheperd Bliss
Notes from Hawai'i:
Trouble in Paradise
Rick Giambetti
Prozac
and Suicide:
an Interview with
Dr. David Healy
Philip Farruggio
Bullies
Lori Allen
Live
from Ramallah:
The Madness of Occupation
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The New Crusade:
America's War on Terrorism
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April 1, 2002
America's War Incorporated: Weapons and Wars 'R' US
By John Stanton and Wayne
Madsen
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. 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..."
If only the citizenry had listened.
Eisenhower's feared military industrial
complex has been swept aside by the U.S. War Corporation. It
took just forty-two 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.
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?
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.
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?
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."
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 $45.00 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.
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.
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.
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.
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.
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 ten 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 producer's
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.
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.
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.
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.
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, ignored 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 confiden ce, 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."
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. They can be reached at: WMadsen777@aol.com
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