Perpetual war is leading to a host of societal ills, yet debates on war and peace are almost entirely absent from public discourse, Robert Wing and Coleen Rowley observe.
By Robert Wing and Coleen Rowley
U.S. Marines patrol street in Shah Karez in Helmand Province, Afghanistan. (U.S. Marine Corps photo by Staff Sgt. Robert Storm)
Last October marked the 16th anniversary of our unending war – or military occupation – in Afghanistan, the longest conflict on foreign soil in U.S. history. The cost to human lives in our current cycle of U.S.-initiated “perpetual wars” throughout the Middle East and Africa is unthinkably high. It runs well into millions of deaths if one counts – as do the Nuremberg principles of international law – victims of spinoff fighting and sectarian violence that erupt after we destroy governance structures.
Also to be counted are other forms of human loss, suffering, illness and early mortality that result from national sanctions, destruction of physical, social and medical infrastructure, loss of homeland, refugee flight, ethnic cleansing, and their psychological after-effects. One has to witness these to grasp their extent in trauma, and they all arise from the Nuremberg-defined “supreme crime” of initiating war. Waging aggressive war is something America is practiced in and does well, with justifications like “fighting terrorism,” “securing our interests,” “protecting innocents,” “spreading democracy,” etc. – as has every aggressor in history that felt the need to explain its aggressions.
Yet few gathered across the country in October, much less gave a thought of lament to the harm we are doing. It’s a topic we’d like to forget. Recalling that domestic opposition to the Vietnam War grew exponentially over the similar (but far shorter) timespan of that aggression, one might wonder what has changed. A numbed, distracted America has reached the point where bellicose presidential threats to destroy North Korea with its puny nuclear arsenal, and cancel the agreement keeping Iran from developing one, barely elicit shrugs among us.
One explanation for our current apathy is that our Military Industrial Complex (President Dwight D. Eisenhower’s term for the institutionalized promoter-beneficiaries of warfare) has long since developed means to effectively counter any collective war-weariness. Vietnam-era MIC apologists publicly worried that “sickly inhibitions against the use of military force” would jeopardize American “interests” around the globe. In time-honored fashion they cast “back-stabbing” blame for the “Vietnam Syndrome” on war-opposing figures of the time like Daniel Ellsberg, Jane Fonda, Dr. Benjamin Spock, even Walter Cronkite, and the millions of so-called “me-generation” draft-resisters who they said caused the “loss” of Vietnam.
Does Vietnam look “lost” to America today? Hardly. What was lost in Vietnam were millions of its own people, a countryside devastated by saturation bombing and the eco-poison Agent Orange, whose toxicity still devastates people there, and the still-present effects of that war.
Lest we forget, it was visited upon them in our name, at our hands, by our leaders and the profit-making military-industrial backers we tolerate. Add the millions of deaths and utter destruction of Cambodia, along with Laos, and we arrive at a massive, prolonged Holocaust-level crime perpetrated by our country, which also suffered – although not nearly at the same rate.
Along with 58,000 official American lives lost, plus hundreds of thousands of physically and many more emotionally damaged veterans, we as a society lost whatever post-World War II moral standing we thought we enjoyed. However we may try to fool ourselves, we all know this inside.
The MIC managers’ answer to our Vietnam unease was brilliantly synergistic, and has made the subsequent costs of war largely invisible to us. First, they quickly eliminated the draft, fine-tuning Vietnam-era social engineering via temporary college-deferments – which had reduced but did not eliminate military service burden-sharing among the better-off – into no burden at all for that class.
In its stead they created a “professional” army whose ranks are manned by “volunteers” from the ever-growing pool of de-industrialized America’s less-advantaged – joined more recently by immigrants seeking US citizenship. The British imperialistic model of employing “surplus” populations as enforcers of global military dominance was thus reborn here. Our “poverty draft” does not elicit much concern among well-off conservatives and liberals as long as token soldiers get honored in commercials, sporting events and holidays.
Our remarkably swift transition from “boots on the ground” to overwhelming reliance on aerial bombing, drone, mercenary, and surrogate (including US-supported Al Qaeda and ISIS proxy) warfare under Obama completed the domestic pain-relieving process of engaging globally in the “foreign entanglements” our first president warned us against. The lopsided asymmetry of this kind of war-making is such that our casualties have become a tiny fraction of a percent of the totals. American war deaths have dropped to levels so infinitesimally low that government lawyers can claim with a straight face (arguing against the need for congressional war authorization) that US-NATO’s aggressive bombing campaigns do not even constitute “war” anymore.
Nor has our government raised taxes to cover war costs (something our Founding Fathers assumed would provide inherent constraints and help make war unpopular). Rather, it has put war costs, already conservatively estimated to be $5.6 trillion since 9/11, onto the ever-expanding national debt ceiling, which “like a speed limit sign that is never enforced” now stands at over $20 trillion, with no end in sight. This level of debt would normally and will eventually – particularly combined with our unending trade deficit – reduce the buying power of the dollar and raise prices for everything we import. It has not yet done so because the dollar’s status as the surrogate world trade currency is propped up by U.S. hard and soft power.
This is the poison icing on the cake of the MIC’s maintenance of war: our abundance of cheap world goods depends on it. On a level we fear to examine, our livelihoods are complicit in the ongoing wars being waged in our name.
Unsurprisingly, we tend not to concern ourselves with our government’s harming of distant others when we do not see it. If those harmed are effectively demonized by our compliant consent-manufacturing mass media so as to make us believe “they deserve it,” our sympathy tends to disappear altogether. But to be human is to care about other humans, and we pretend otherwise at our own moral peril. Veterans who cannot keep buried their psychic wounds of combat – from Vietnam to the present wars – are committing suicide at the rate of 22 per day.
Given our somnolent acceptance of the notion that this unprecedented state of perpetual war is somehow protecting our safety, it’s ironic that military service is emerging as significantly correlated with, if not a cause of, America’s dramatic increase in mass shootings and other domestic terror-type killings. (PTSD-related murders overall also remain uncounted.) Researchers studying recent lists of mass shooters find veterans are over twice as likely to be mass shooters. Post-combat related “copy-cat” homicidal violence might be a direct externality of training and then assigning young people to commit murder overseas.
A super-hero style militaristic culture promoted by the Pentagon and CIA-backed entertainment industry (also see this) helps sustain public momentum for war but does not generate peace at home. How much worse will this problem become now that the military is relaxing its standards and accepting applicants with histories of mental illness? Earlier writing-on-the-wall consequences appeared when “Oklahoma bomber” Timothy McVeigh killed 168; “DC Sniper” John Muhammad killed 17, and Robert Flores shot his three professors. All three were veterans of the first Gulf War.
A Homeland Security analyst warned that we were creating human time bombs – only to be personally disparaged for his politically incorrect but accurate prediction.
We have an engorged, non-stop war-making machine that is reliant on high tech weapons systems, normalized ubiquitous surveillance, the congressional hostage-taking presence of defense manufacturing and support industries or bases in every district, the narrowing of mass media discourse to stage-managed, stereotyped liberal-conservative mudslinging and subsidized glorification of war prowess, and not least, the continual re-creation of enemies to fight.
Beyond post-traumatic killings and suicides, and our massive debt, the costs of maintaining this behemoth afflicts America in other ways. Blowback is likely a factor in our record-level teen suicides, road rage incidents and shootings both of and by an increasingly militarized police force; an epidemic in opioid and other addictions; a hollowed out productive economy that underpays most workers; “Ponzi” style financing of our economy, and our utterly unsustainable late-stage imperial dependence on the war industry for our economic vitality.
We can also add the compounding of poisons into the air, water, and soil that will touch everyone’s children long into the future as we focus our wars where the oil is. This is in order to control the world’s petroleum supply, which is wrecking the world’s weather – via the activities of the number one institutional polluter in the world: the U.S. military.
Our out of control national destructiveness and its unspeakable costs constitute the “spiritual death” that Martin Luther King warned us about at the height of the Vietnam War, yet they remain mostly unaddressed in public discourse. How much longer before, finally, we can no longer pretend not to notice the taste of poison in this recipe concocted to make war palatable?
Robert Wing is a former diplomat and Asia/China analyst. As acting Consul General in Sumatra, he monitored the Aceh insurgency and set up safety networks to protect US citizens. In Hong Kong, he tracked reports of American POW/MIAs and oversaw the US program for Vietnamese “boat refugees”, enacting measures to protect those who were endangered and securing the release and resettlement of refugees from longstanding detention at a camp in China.
Coleen Rowley is a retired FBI agent and former Minneapolis Division Legal Counsel who disclosed serious pre 9-11 FBI failures to the Joint Intelligence Committee Inquiry, the Senate Judiciary Committee and to the Inspector General of the Department of Justice. Rowley was consequently selected along with two other whistleblowers as Time Magazine’s 2002 “Persons of the Year.”
Brilliant exceot for your less than subtle call for a renewed draft. I was drafted an served but in no way did my service lead to an and to our addiction to war, neither in WWI, II, Korea or Vietna. Alll a draft does is encourage the crazies who seem to love war. Can you imagigine Trump & Co. armed with a million or more drfatees and ready to kill?
Headline:
Air Force Sets Another B-52 Smart Bomb Record in Afghanistan
The “smart bombs” in question are listed at their Wiki as costing $25,000 each. So the cost of that armament alone was $600,000. The B-52 flies from Qatar, a round trip which we’ll say takes 5 hours. Operating cost per hour of a B-52 is $70,000, so five times that is $350,000. What was the goal of this operation?
Kind of vague, isn’t it? No matter, Job One was to inflate the profits of the Military Industrial Complex. In the words of the Codpiece Commander, Mission Accomplished!
On down in the link was this tidbit:
h**ps://www.military.com/daily-news/2018/02/06/air-force-sets-another-b-52-smart-bomb-record-afghanistan.html
We don’t have many F-22s. They’re terribly expensive to operate – $44,000 for every flight hour. Wearing them out on trivial operations isn’t very bright. They’re going against the Taliban, an outfit with no known air defense system or air force of its own. Total insanity, especially since the A-10 could be doing the job for approximately $11,000 per hour. But the US Air Force hates the A-10. It is working very hard to get rid of it.
And as for the modern light attack airplanes which can operate under $1,000 per hour, heaven forbid that our great nation will ever be stuck with such things! The Air Force does just enough pretending to investigate them to keep some congressmen off their back, and that’s it! After all, a person won’t be in the Air Force forever, and you want a good job waiting for you in the MIC if at all possible.
US Air Force kills combat demo for light attack aircraft
h**ps://www.defensenews.com/air/2018/02/02/us-air-force-kills-combat-demo-for-light-attack-aircraft/
Fantastic & critically important article! This wil be shared.
You said that our abundance of cheap world goods depends on war. I don’t see how this is true. In fact, the trillions of dollars dropped down the military rat hole is a direct reduction of their otherwise use for productive and peaceful goods and services for our people. Please show me just how all this war making creates cheap goods for us; I maintain it does just the opposite.
America needs desperately to end its policy of requiring that all other nations of the world effectively swear allegiance to the United States, with refusal to do so opening these other countries up to regime change and endless war. The Cold War ended on December 31, 1991, with the collapse of the Bolshevik dictatorship in Russia. Instead of seeking “peace without victory”, America has chosen to treat Russia as a defeated power. Russia closed its military bases in Eastern Europe and withdrew its troops. America should have closed its military bases in Western Europe and withdrawn its troops. Instead, America extended NATO membership to the nations of Eastern Europe and the Baltic States, pushing NATO right up to Russia’s western border. This was a highly provocative act against a country we are at peace with.
The time has come for America’s policy makers to disenthrall themselves from Cold War thinking, recognize that a new day has dawned in Eurasia, and stop the provocative acts against Russia. The time has come for America to adopt a Global Good Neighbor Policy, to stop interfering in the internal affairs of other countries, and to end the drive for global hegemony, a global empire. The world desperately needs and wants peace, REAL PEACE, not a Pax Americana.
It’s about time that the American government remembered and acted on the wise foreign policy advice given by President George Washington in his presidential Farewell Address in 1796: “avoid foreign entanglements”. Sadly, to want America to mind its own business in foreign affairs is widely and blindly denounced as “isolationism”. The specter of Munich and appeasement are routinely invoked as a reason to intervene. Yet not every questionable or even bad situation overseas is another Munich, nor does it warrant American intervention every time. Our motives, as in Iraq, Libya, and Syria are often suspect, and sometimes (often?) intervention, whether clandestine or open, by military intelligence, or other means just makes the situation worse. The whole school of foreign policy thought, generally and benignly falsely flagged as “internationalism” and more honestly known as “interventionism” deserves a thorough and honest review of its accomplishments since WWII. Both our motives and our accomplishments in post-WWII foreign interventions would come in for scathing review and criticism. Perhaps the time has come to shelve the all too often misused example of Munich and appeasement as a guide for American foreign policy and to adopt a new Global Good Neighbor Policy based on the refreshing idea that America doesn’t have all the answers to all the world’s problems and that America should mind its own business. That’s the essence of the wise foreign policy advice George Washington gave us in 1796. Maybe we should wise up and take his advice.
It is far worse than Apathy, most Americans actually belive that they themselves are VICTIMS…….Here it is in print
A Nation of Victims: The Decay of the American Character Paperback – August 15, 1993
The reason I preferred Trump over Hillary was that as between the two, he was the “peace candidate”. I am somewhat disappointed, but still don’t think I was wrong.
Both major parties are so beholden to and entrenched by the Deep State that there is no chance for a true “peace candidate” to make it to the general election. They’ll say whatever the voters want to hear, and then do whatever the MIC and Wall Street wants once they are elected. I always vote for the “peace candidate” in the primaries, even when it means switching parties. But our only hope to get someone to actually govern that way is to elect a Green or a Libertarian. I am hopeful that Trump has finally exposed the two party system for the farce it truly is, and that we can get a third party candidate who truly represents the will of the people into office in 2020.
You could have done what I did and protested by refusing to vote for an obvious Charade. Your vote legitimates an illegitimate process and thus allows it to perpetuate. Whatever Trump does now, your Signature of Approval, via your vote, is on it. If he nukes North Korea or invades Iran and uses nukes in that folly, it will be done in your name because of your vote.
There were no choices in the 2016 Presidential Election. It was Dumb & Dumber. It was Awful & Awful-er. It was Tales the Plutocracy wins and Heads the Plutocracy wins. That’s not a choice. It’s a Farce.
Trump’s tax cut to The Rich tells us all we need to know. Nothing else can be accomplished except Mayhem & Gridlock, but by golly, they somehow miraculously pushed through tax legislation extremely beneficial to The Rich thus ensuring the further concentration of wealth and greater wealth disparity.
What’s even more interesting than the tax legislation being “miraculously pushed through” is the US Senate’s votes on all issues concerning Israel. The record is 100 – 0 in favor of Israel.
We live in a war culture. We worship our trained killers, and call them heroes. Our Christian “God” believes in torture and revenge. Millions of us are employed in this death culture, earning our salaries by enabling the killing of millions of our fellow humans. These “everyday monsters” making the tools of mayhem, never give a thought to the awful crimes they are part of.
When I saw the bolded title at the RealClearDefense site this essay immediately came to mind.
“The U.S. Isn’t Winning In Afghanistan? – And That’s Okay
According to the author, a Forever War is OK if there is a useful something or other happening.
Skipping to the end of the piece, I discovered that worthy goal.
Since I didn’t read the piece, I’m going to make some deductions from that conclusion. Maintaining chaos – ‘holding the line’ – maximizes the profit for the MIC. It also serves Holy Israel very well.
So from that viewpoint, staying in Afghanistan for the next hundred years makes perfect sense.
https://arcdigital.media/the-u-s-isnt-winning-in-afghanistan-and-that-s-okay-dc69e9c257ce
Coleen Rowley is a true American hero. I am proud that I contributed to her 2006 campaign as the Democratic candidate for Congress in Minnesota. I would like to think that the voters are finally ready to hear her message. I hope she has plans to run for a major office again.
That sentence reminded me of the time when the Army tried out the “Army Of One” slogan to appeal to the young men who weren’t satisfied with becoming merely heroes when they put on their new uniforms. No, they would instantly become “super heroes. As a kid I’d have been vulnerable to such a pitch. Carrying a slow-firing rifle was one thing, but a man with a sub-machine gun could surely spray death at everything in sight!
The authors speak of the Military Industrial Complex, but they avoided mentioning the partnership that group has with Israel. Both groups benefit from the way the US has become. Vast and never-ending profits from the use of expensive weapons in the never-ending wars. Consider the little M1156 fuse which turns “dumb” artillery shells into “smart” ones. From the picture at the Wiki I’d say it’s about the size of a fat banana, and costs around $10,000. Best of all, it gets used once and is destroyed!
And who benefits from those wars? The unmentioned state of Israel.
Overall, I’d rank this essay as a fine synthesis of many themes.
So 1984. Thanks for highlighting what’s really going on.
What a great piece.
Thank you, Nat, for keeping your dad’s legacy alive in the best manner possible.
Peace, everyone.
Yes, thank you Nat!!!!!
A lot of people are pitching in to write here and I’m appreciating everyone’s work.
Your courage and fair-mindedness continues in your father’s tradition.
And I say that because based on what I have read of your work (unlike myself often slipping into unsubstantiated, hyper opinion, unfortunately) your work is analytical, not ideological, to uncover as best as one can, the truth behind the superficial.
Read chapter 6 of Mein Kampf to learn the techniques and power of war propaganda. Our society is crazy because most people have been manipulated by war propaganda. Our entire society is suffering from a mass hypnosis and reality, for them, is what the war propaganda tells them.
“The crazy muslims are coming to kill us and eat our babies!”
The war machine itself is justified by the myth of the “war over slavery”, which says Abraham Lincoln invaded the South and killed hundreds of thousands of people to do something good and noble for someone else. But war is not about doing good for someone else. It is about conquering territory, conquering resources, and conquering people. The brainwashing began in our childhood from government run schools and cultural myths.
well said, stan!
in addition, FWIW, our wars and other barbaric acts remind me of how ants behave – aggressive, belligerent, mindless, – one type of ants replenishes its work force by going on the march to conquer and enslave another colony….it’s disturbing to think of that, since most people don’t identify with insects, although Kafka had a bit of fun with the guy who woke up to find himself a roach on its back…..a metaphor for how helpless we are against social forces/institutions that have run amok???
“The war machine itself is justified by the myth of the “war over slavery”, which says Abraham Lincoln invaded the South and killed hundreds of thousands of people to do something good and noble for someone else. But war is not about doing good for someone else. It is about conquering territory, conquering resources, and conquering people. The brainwashing began in our childhood from government run schools and cultural myths.”
Very astute observation, Stan. War is the opposite of Gandhi – MLK approach or philosophy whatever one wants to call it. I wonder if any current black legislator in congress cares anymore about MLK’s Riverside Church, New York Speech in 1967. Kamala Harris, Cory Booker , and other black leaders are becoming one of the torch-bearers of these never ending brutal wars against the helpless, weak Nations on the planet. Forget about other political figures, has any black political leader in Washington has said anything against this New Nuclear Posture/Strategy document, this almost two trillion dollars project for nuclear superiority, which came out a few days ago!
And there is no Nation in Western Europe who have shown their disagreement with these never ending wars and these new Defense and Nuclear weapons doctrines. What a moral collapse of “The West”, it is hard to comprehend it.
The war mongers have spun a mass hysteria on us. Deep down, I think, most people are troubled and horrified by it, although the first tendency in public for some may be to spout the manufactured talking points (about the “dangers” we face) pounded out on the mass media every day. Self censorship against the “subversive” deep down horror people really feel about the endless violence plays a role, I think, in keeping us quiet.
A wake up moment for me about our (manufactured?) political divide was a brief conversation with a couple who I expected were my political opposite – conservative Republicans. They were strongly anti Clinton (well, me too…….) and they therefore voted for Trump. When I mentioned the endless regime change wars (that madam secretary Clinton herself is all for) the husband slowly shook his head with a strong unforgettable expression of disgust for our endless destabilizing and violent wars. Wow, he feels like I do, I thought.
When Bernie was kneecapped by the Clinton machine, in Texas, a shoo-in for Trump, my protest vote was for Gary Johnson. Although his Libertarian ideas didn’t work for me, I was heartened when he didn’t kniw where Aleppo was. Great! Maybe he really meant putting an end to regime change wars. And Aleppo would be safe from our bombing. (Of course he was vilified in the media for his “ignorance” – the message being that it’s most important for our candidates to be primed and ready for business on our military targets.
This country is terrorized by its own government. The television ads for video games of bloody dehumanized war games and street fighting in any sane country would be seen as unacceptable. Not here.
Thank you Robert Wing and Coleen Rowley for your powerful piece. Excellent!
Conservative Republicans have no problem with Perpetual War so long as it’s “Their Man” promulgating it.
For them, as it is for the Liberal Democrats, it’s purely about Tribalism. It’s Political Football with only two teams and every election is the Super Bowl and coverage of their Political Super Bowl is now 24/7 with no relief.
My wife’s family is Conservative Republican and they have become virulently mean & nasty & vicious in the past two years. When we visited over Christmas, they actually proclaimed they would like to see Trump nuke North Korea. When my wife & I explained the implications of that, they shrugged as if to say, “you have to do what you have to do.”
My wife’s family are all diehard Roman Catholics and they are now so mean & nasty & vicious, they have taken a stand against the Pope. To them, Pope Francis, the Fascist Appeaser from Argentina, is a Socialist and consequently they cannot stand him and in fact loathe him.
Everyone has gone INSANE. Trump is symbolic of the INSANITY. He’s the perfect POTUS for this time. He’s the True Reflection of America and what a horrible sight it is.
Trump is the Symptom of late-term Syphilis, not the disease itself. What’s bizarre is some people are proud of this grotesque Symptom and actually support it and boast about the repugnancy.
The syphilis analogy is perfect. Let’s face it–this is a very sick society, probably beyond recovery. War is too profitable and that seems to be what it’s all about: short- term gain/pleasure with no thought to the long-term consequences to the world/body.
It’s incredible to me that this is happening right before our eyes and it seems there’s nothing we can do to stop it, despite being the most evolved, biggest-brained species on earth!
“Conservative Republicans have no problem with Perpetual War so long as it’s “Their Man” promulgating it.”
hah!……..
“My wife’s family are all diehard Roman Catholics and they are now so mean & nasty & vicious, they have taken a stand against the Pope. To them, Pope Francis, the Fascist Appeaser from Argentina, is a Socialist and consequently they cannot stand him and in fact loathe him.”
that’s really sad…. that they’re so nasty and vicious – must be difficult to sit there and listen to it…..
One day an opportunity may arise that you feel so confident that it will get their attention and fit in with their deepest values (if there are any good ones still lurking somewhere in their unconscious minds, lol) that you’ll have a chance to sweetly ask them about it if they’re in a good mood…..something to give them pause without angering them…..tough to do, I suspect.
Are their any left leaning decent courageous Jesuits remaining in the RC Church in this country who are speaking out? – weren’t the Jesuit priests the ones standing up for and dying for the indigenous people in Central American countries against all the usual suspects – right wing consortium of multinational corporations, wealthy families and American “interests” as defined by the State Dept et al?
It’s so very hard, I think, to crack the bizarre anger engulfing so many people that I suspect it’s a sign of being propagandized and really a denial of some conflicting thoughts that may be simmering deep down….otherwise why are they so angry and belligerent, unless they’re experiencing a deep conflict which they are trying to deal with?
Sounds like your in laws have been terrorized.
I don;t think much about religion, but I’d like to think it has less to do with being Catholic and more to do with the war mongering “tribalism” you refer to that has in its grip people from each of the main religions? I think there are some smaller religions based on non violence?
I’m old. I don’t expect things to change while I’m alive. It’s likely to come crashing down with some “Gotterdamrung” explosion of bombs or financial collapse or both that (if they survive) will chasten some people for a while and then it will all start again……..
sorry, I’m discouraged….and it seems to be in our DNA.
although I don’t know if we got this way via the Cro Magnon line or the Neanderthals….sometimes I like to imagine that the maligned Neanderthals were the sweet ones……
evelync –
“Are their any left leaning decent courageous Jesuits remaining in the RC Church in this country who are speaking out? – weren’t the Jesuit priests the ones standing up for and dying for the indigenous people in Central American countries against all the usual suspects – right wing consortium of multinational corporations, wealthy families and American “interests” as defined by the State Dept et al?”
It is apparent that there is no opposition left in the country to these never ending wars except for a small minority who read these alternative media articles or watch news on these sites. Unfortunately, it seems like Jesuit Priests are with the war mongering Liberal democrats kind of policies now. We have Governor here in California , who in his young age was trained for a short time to be a Jesuits. He used to talk about these issues – peace and nuclear weapons – during 1970’s when he became Governor, the first time around. We were really fond of him during those days. It is all in the past now. He mostly walks in lock step with the Democratic Party now, worrying about building his legacy or something.
We are witness to this complete moral and spiritual death of the country. It happened so fast – during the last three or four decades. Now, past the mid-seventies in age, it is rather sad to to reflect about it
Dave P. thank you for your observation about the California Governor. I completely agree. California is not really a Blue State, it’s more like a pragmatic Corprate State. Its government is certainly not one “of, or for The People”.
The power of the DNC was clearly felt in the last election cycle, with fraud from top to bottom, but who will look into that, in these times?
As a person Jesuit-educated, both high school (Dallas Jesuit) and college (Spring Hill), I can tell you the majority of Jesuits, especially the ones higher up the Food Chain, are quite fond of The Rich and thus lean more conservative than liberal. They know where their bread is buttered and they play the field, obviously. Those institutions require significant donations to operate and thrive and the majority of that funding comes from their highly conservative donor base.
Daniel Berrigan comes to mind and his noble & relentless campaign against The School of Americas. He was successful enough that it changed its name but not necessarily the name of its game.
He passed away in 2016 at the age of 94 and I believe he was the last, or one of the last, of a dying breed.
Yes, Afghanistan is one of many examples underscoring an unofficial policy of Perpetual War, but the recent expansion of America’s presence in Afghanistan after Obama’s diminution of it has a very different tenor. It’s now about Terror (under the aegis of fighting Terror), not Nation Building as if Nation Building was ever what it was about.
Gee, what a great idea. These Generals are brilliant, are they not? Afghanistan was the Soviet Union’s straw that broke its camel’s back and the American Generals have effectively said, “we want our straw now”. Brilliant. What would Einstein say to such stellar logic?
The following is an example of that Terror in lieu of so-called Nation Building.
Afghanistan – U.S. Special Forces Commit Drive-By Murder (Video)
A very perceptive analysis…I would only add that the growing polarization of wealth has greatly added to the apathy and despair that has desensitized most Americans toward the destructive policies of their overlords, Time is needed to protest, the channels are few and the consequences are greater than ever. Students are preoccupied with debt and their curriculum has been reduced to job training with fewer prospects.The ‘liberal education” of the sixties is now the private reserve of a privileged few.
Very well stated BobH. Thanks.
Yes, I agree with you that inequality in the US is reaching epic proportions. Honestly, if I was rich or a politician, I’d be even more concerned. BTW, here are a pair of matched books on logic[1] and rhetoric[2]. I never learned that at school. Like you said, I was too busy training for a job and these kinds of courses weren’t on the menu. Thank you for the kind remark.
[1] Elements of logic : Whately, Richard, 1787-1863 – Internet Archive
[2] Elements of rhetoric: Whately, Richard, 1787-1863 – Internet Archive
This Total Thread is invaluable and really underscores the quality and sincerity of readership here.
Bless you Robert Parry for your lifetime os sincere work. Too, and importantly, one can get the sense that quality and informed internet discussions can be conducted for the benefit of all…
godenich, your method of referring to concepts presented in your essay to your list is brilliant. If those subjects were hot linked it would present like an instruction manual. Thank You!
“Recipe Concocted for Perpetual War Is a Bitter One”
Of the men who made America[1-3] in industry[4-10] and finance[11-16], those that brewed up this snake oil required one essential ingredient for that recipe and that was the income tax[17]. One may speak of money[18] and banking[19], but without this perennial and compulsory source of revenue, this confiscation of one’s own labor, this income tax,.. no sane politician would support the proposition. Without it, attempts to fund the effort by increasing taxes on industry, finance or the public would be met with stiff resistance. Our government, via the central bank, would have to shackle the public with US Treasury Debt Bonds, using future labor of the public as collateral, to fund a constant stream of dollars or a great media campaign would have to be financed to sell liberty bonds to the public. Yes, we must recall our history lest we forget this, Nuremberg[20] or it’s legacy that continues with us to this day[21,22].
Question the income tax or war narrative and you may very well receive the “John T Flynn” treatment[23 or worse** plus a corrupted form of, “America First”, propagandized to repel the public and whip up a patriotic tune, requiring only a series of contrived incidents or false flags* be raised to fearmonger the public into perpetual war. Consider rather straightening out the $21 trillion DOD accounting discrepancy[24], adopting a decentralized tax reform with limited inheritance[25, 26]*** and saying, “To Hell with War”.
* 1. A flag flown to disguise the true identity or affiliation of a ship. 2. A political or military act orchestrated in such a way that it appears to have been carried out by a party that is not in fact responsible.
** Irwin Schiff
*** Proposals for consumption taxes, subsidies and tariffs are a red herring that impoverish the public as Great Britain discovered in the 18th century and exacerbated in the 19th century with the income tax.
[1] The Men Who Built America Complete Part 1 – 6 | Youtube
[2] Men who are making America | BC Forbes | Internet Archives | 1918
[3] Men of Wealth | John T Flynn | 1941
[4] The First Tycoon | TJ Stiles | Downpour | 2009
[5] Titan | Ron Chernow | Downpour | 2013
[6] The People’s Tycoon | Steven Watts | Downpour | 2008
[7] Autobiography of Andrew Carnegie | Downpour | 2012
[8] Westinghouse | Youtube
[9] Selfridge & Woolworth | Youtube
[10] William Randolph Hearst | Youtube
[11] Lords of Finance | Liaquat Ahamed | Downpour | 2009
[12] Dark Genius of Wall Street | Edward J Renehan | Downpour | 2006
[13] House of Morgan | Ron Chernow | Downpour | 2014
[14] The Warburgs | Ron Chernow | Downpour | 2016
[15] Baring Brothers | The Baring Archive Symposium | 2013 (looking for good book)
[16] The House of Rothschild | Niall Ferguson| Waiting for mp3 or pdf | 1999
[17] The Income Tax | Edwin Seligman | 1911
[18] A History of Money | Glyn Davies| 2002
[19] History of Banking | John Lawson | Internet Archives | 1850
[20] Nuremberg (1996) | Youtube
[21] Operation Paperclip:The CIA and the Nazis | Youtube
[22] Meet Allen Dulles: Fascist Spymaster | Corbett Report | Youtube
[23] John T Flynn | Wikipedia
[24] Dr. Mark Skidmore – $21 Trillion Missing from US Federal Budget | Youtube
[25] Taxation for the 21ST Century: The Automated Payment Transaction (APT) Tax | SSRN
[26] Alternative Proposals Reform, May 11 2005 | Video | C-SPAN
I am glad that you are inclined to document your studies, although I will suggest that income tax is necessary for proper as well as improper government activities. The money that leads us astray operates largely by controlling our mass media and elections, which could be prohibited by constitutional amendments. If Congress and the Executive agencies, and thereby the Judiciary operated in the interest of the people, we would have far more beneficial domestic and foreign policies.
Our unregulated free market economy allows the unethical bully to prevail in nearly all areas, including politics. Requiring quality and truth in manufacturing, advertising, and, other services would restore sanity and remove most incentives for lying, cheating, and stealing, the belief system and principle skills of the bully class who have risen to make up our oligarchy.
Thank you. I agree with the spirit of what you say, although I use the term “crony capitalism” to describe our current system instead of “unregulated free market”. You see, I favor “free market” in a more favorable sense than “planned market”. I hope you will find time to peruse [25] and view the five minutes of Edgar Feige in [26] (second speaker), as well as the short 3rd party “APT Tax” video on Youtube. Two of my critiques of the APT would be to decentralize (flatten) revenue disbursements toward local governments and limit inheritance to some fairly high, but reasonable value, inflation adjusted.
You may find that the 0.3% Automated Payment Transaction(APT) tax meets your requirements for funding government at a significant savings for working families, as well as working singles. Gross currency flows of roughly $4 quadrillion (12 zeroes) per year may be found here[1,2] for estimating potential tax revenues, with caveats of course. They may be compared to revenue figures from our current tax system on the www usgovernmentrevenue com website.
[1] Intraday Liquidity Flows | FRBNY | 2016
[2] Worldwide Currency Usage & Trends | SWIFT
Correction: 15 zeroes – I’m not used to counting that high:)
Thank you Coleen Rowley for your honesty and bravery.
I was released from active service 30 days before LBJ’s 1965 run-up to Vietnam, where the divide between JFK and LBJ on escalation was proven, in my opinion, but it took another several years or more for me to understand that the difference between myself, the wonderful guys I served with, and the indifference I experienced at home, was Class. Remember that the draft was in effect at that time so that if you were young healthy and ill advised, you were going to be drafted. Ultimately the draft failed the Military in Vietnam because America slowly realized that The Vietnam War was a Tragedy.
Young Officers like Norman Schwarzkopf Jr. and Colin Powell however, would ultimately come up with a better idea, a Professional Military where internal protest would be unacceptable (Witness Chelsea Manning). The class divide would remain, but the wise ass college guys and gals would be sidelined by Officer Ranking.
It all worked beautifully until GWOT proved to be never ending death and combat plus civilian a catastrophe. I firmly believe that even that PR ploy has now failed and America is finally sick of our Neocon (We never fight) inspired Warring…
Brilliant deduction of how the U.S. military went corporate and dissent from within was squashed; except for brave souls like Manning, who is now running for senator against a well established neo-conservative in her home state of Maryland.
The other side of the coin to a privatized, corporate military, is the channeling of that same concept in domestic federal, state and local militarized police to make sure that organized dissent comes nowhere near attaining the influence it had in the late sixties and early seventies. Standing Rock was a great example of how to turn dissent into profit by simply arresting protesters and throwing them into the corporate judicial prison network.
Moreover, competition for class hierarchy keeps most Americans busy fighting one another and ignorant of most aspects of both domestic and foreign policy.
Thank you mijkmijld for the careful reading…
Good observations by both of you.
Sums it up, pretty nicely.
And, with the advent of NSA comm surveillance, storage, mining for dirt on people, who and how is anything going to change?
If asked to make a statement about American apathy, I will reference this very fine article.
When it comes to us Americans and our apathy towards our country’s wars, this article points to how these wars hardly effect us U.S. citizens. The article in it’s own way describes this condition in such a way as you can clearly see that this bed of apathy was purposely made, as to cut down on any interference that a peace rally could create. Somehow, we Americans have been put into a very convenient box. A box where nothing will hurt you, but where your ignorance could eventually lead to your death. Although, why worry, there will never be a nuclear war….right?
Read what China has to say…..
http://www.xinhuanet.com/english/2018-02/04/c_136948195.htm
The U.S. suggestion that the Chinese might entertain the outrageously stupid notion of advantageous “limited” use of nuclear weapons really beggars belief. The response by the spokesman for the Chinese Defense Ministry is so on the mark.
The “deterrence” rationale used as a so-called “response” to Russian modernization and innovation with regard to their anti-ballistic nuclear defense capability and “tactical” nuclear “deterrence” capability takes us back to the costly spiraling dangers of an arms race that eliminates all previous progress on these issues. Both sides say what they do is a “reaction” to the other side. Obviously (to me anyway) the onus of responsibility with regard to “aggression and threat” and the need for an attitude of de-escalation can clearly be placed at the feet of uncle sam. But it’s difficult to find an American outlet, even those critical or wary of our nuclear “modernization” and posturing, who don’t at the same time fail to acknowledge U.S. aggression while standing by the canard of Russian aggression in Ukraine. Hashtag Hopeless.
The Chinese have so far Gregory proved very useful to capitalistic goals, by providing Western corporations with cheap labor, and by it’s massive appeal it possesses due to China’s huge population as a new aspiring market, the West could find no better refuge from Unionized members of it’s own governments than when Nixon decided to play ping pong with this once ignored and isolated Asian nation. The love affair the West created with China, even found China a great consumer of buying up American debt. So what went wrong.
As if the rise of China was not to be expected, now the West, or rather the U.S., finds it necessary to rattle their sabers at the ever growing China, as it grows in size. Worst, is what makes China so intimidating to the U.S. is China’s One Border One Road infrastructural program. The similarity OBOR has to the once infamous U.S. Marshall Plan, is totally unnerving. To make matters worst China is very good friends with Russia’s Putin.
America will always be fighting wars, that is unless America decides to join the rest of the world, instead of bombing it into submission. Joe
Thoughtful comment, Joe. Our Establishment certainly betrayed the backbone of our nation–the blood, sweat, and tears of labor.
And now the U.S. is scrambling…in the wrong direction. The Chinese spokesmen said it well-that America “should conform to the irreversible world trend of peace and development rather than run in the opposite direction.”
We should play better at ping-pong, eh?
That is a very sensible and polished statement of the National Defense Ministry of China. Of course any state (except ours) has those who know what sounds best, but the history and needs and interests of both Russia and China are consistent with their statements on foreign policy. It is only the US that feels the need to bully to be safe, and that certainly is the pattern of the tyrant personalities that rise to power in our plutocracy. They are bullying the US by threatening other nations with war.
Even if the US is merely isolated, within a generation it will be doing poorly in comparison with Russia and China. This and its debt service from this warmongering era may reduce the middle class to a realistic view. With luck the pressure on the poorest will explode into riots, populist parties may form, and the underlying problems of money power controlling elections and mass media may be addressed in constitutional reform. But I suspect that as long as we have an unregulated free market economy, the bully boys will prevail, and will set up tyrannies dependent upon fake enemies and foreign wars.
Sam your observations are spot on. Today I watched Paul Jay host a eight part series (still more parts to come) on therealnews.com where he interviewed historians Gerald Horne and Peter Kuznick on ‘undoing the new deal’. After watching this series, I could not help but imagine what the world would have been like to if the U.S. had had Henry Wallace, as President. Another moment in time would be the assassination era of the sixties, that helped keep America in the grips of those powers behind the curtain.
We Americans are so in the dark to our history, let alone our being well versed on our current events, that it really makes one wonder to if we poorly informed Americans stand a chance to overcome all that ills our nation. This lack of wisdom, as you know Sam, is one of our nation’s biggest problems. Is it any wonder, that in a warring nation, who does not have a draft, or issues a war tax, that wars seem far off and away from disturbing our comfortable American way of life?
China, and Russia, are in my view, just doing what they need to, to make life in their countries a suitable condition in order for their citizens to thrive. America puts it’s needs and wants before all others, and with this selfishness we call ourselves exceptional and indispensable to boot. The sadder part is, is that both China and Russia have reached out to better our relations, but with treaties and handshakes the U.S. has often in it’s past proved to how it can’t be trusted. How long Sam, before the politeness of China and Russia wears off?
Sam we Americans need to help encourage our government to quit with the wars, and as I have said so many other times before Sam, America must join the rest of the world, and quit blowing it up. Joe
Yes, “America must join the rest of the world,” and cease its warmongering, like the bully boy in counseling. But there are no counselors: ending that will take more than encouragement by Americans. It is the bullies who rise in an unregulated free market economy like the US, who with money control the mass media and elections of our former democracy, and bullies despise their moral superiors; they speak only the language of force.
When the “politeness of China and Russia wears off” as the US zionist/MIC plutocracy seeks, the MIC will have its provocations to ever-greater budgets, but of course the US will lose by economic isolation, military losses in its foolhardy confrontation zones, and the crushing debt service of its era of warmongering. The middle class may become more realistic but will remain cowardly sheep dreaming of wealth. Only when the poorest rise in rebellion to terrify the rich, to infiltrate the police and national guard to deny enforcement to the rich, will there be any hope of the constitutional reforms we need to restore democracy, and to restore sanity to foreign policy.
While we are on the subject of war, listen to part 8 of historian Peter Kuznick describe the American escalation of weapons, and take in his learned read of this American history.
http://therealnews.com/t2/story:21011:Undoing-the-New-Deal—The-Age-of-Lunacy-%28Pt8%29
That was good. I’m keeping that whole broadcast. Thanks.
I did, and it’s worth it.
I’m glad you enjoyed it.
Thank you Joe. Then try to fathom the double speak of Mr. Pence:
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2018/feb/04/mike-pence-north-korea-winter-olympics
“Vice-president Mike Pence will stop North Korea “hijacking” the Winter Olympics, an aide said on Sunday, by using his own presence at the Games to remind the world “everything the North Koreans do at the Olympics is a charade to cover up the fact that they are the most tyrannical and oppressive regime on the planet”.
Such rhetoric stands at odds with recent diplomatic exchanges between North and South Korea. The two countries will march under one flag at the Games, which begin in Pyeongchang on Friday. They will also field a joint women’s ice hockey team.
Diplomacy around the Games has been hailed as a success, at odds with confrontational and inflammatory rhetoric from the White House and Pyongyang since Donald Trump became president last year.”
Could it be that there is a more “tyrannical and oppressive regime” to insure that “the most tyrannical and oppressive regime[s]” represent the justification for the supremely lucrative and oppressive business of endless war?
“Indiana wants me. Oh I can’t go back there.”
For some time now mijkmijld I’ve been curious to what effect Moon Jae in would have on his S Korean countries progress at talks with his N Korean counterweight Kim Jung un, looks pretty encouraging until the U.S. sends in Mike Pence. Pence would do well to follow his Christian believes of ‘peace’, ‘being kind to others’, and ‘blessed are the peacemakers’ philosophy would soon take over, and avoid a nuclear halocaust. Go figure.
The U.S. isn’t interested in that much peace for the Korean Peninsula, in as much as the U.S. is pressuring the need for missile technology, and the business to stock pile the weapons enough to secure a U.S. sanctuary for future MIC profits, and exploitation of commercial trade will remain tied to the U.S. Sphere. Somewhere in there that’s all suppose to be good for us Americans, only I am blinded by it’s agressive aims, as well as I am extremely short sighted to see its very needs. Joe
Strategic Culture Foundation, and see again:
https://www.strategic-culture.org/news/2018/02/03/us-foreign-policies-remain-unchanged-since-1948.html
https://www.strategic-culture.org/news/2018/02/04/defense-programs-embarrassing-failures-problem-not-mentioned-us-president-state-union-address.html
https://www.strategic-culture.org/news/2018/02/01/why-america-bad-choices-can-lead-shooting-war-with-turkey-in-syria.html
Hey mijkmijld thanks for the links, I really enjoyed reading them.
For starters I really like reading Eric Zuesse, and with this linked article Zuesse is very Zuesse. I must say that the U.S. has proved over time and time again, that it’s word cannot be trusted. If an American President reaches out to say a country like Russia, you can be doubly sure that the CIA or State Department will not be on board. When Eisenhower made his “The Chance for Peace” speech April 16, 1953 responding to Russia’s outstretched hand after Stalin died, his making an appeal for disarmament, it only took but two days for John Foster Dulles to undo everything the retired General, who was now the sitting President, had made in his speech for a peaceful world. So, not only are we Americans not to be trusted to observe conditions of a treaty we sign, but apparently with even the good words of a president to be made within his Commander and Chief speech, are to be ignored when the powers under him so wish for it to be that way. Talk about screwing up a solution for peace…wow! Thank you very much (not) John Foster Dulles.
https://www.eisenhower.archives.gov/all_about_ike/speeches/chance_for_peace.pdf
The U.S. debt is beyond believable, and the Defense Department has proven overtime to not be responsible in anyway what so ever to be respectful with our citizen tax dollars. In the summer of 2016 the Inspector General of the DOD put out a report declaring that the DOD cannot locate 6.5 trillion dollars. This is similar to when in 2001 on September 10, Defense Secretary Donald Trump revealed that the DOD then could not account for 2.5 trillion dollars. Yet, never is this a subject of our so slanted, and misguided MSM’s, who’s responsibly it is to report to us the most important news we citizens should know about. Also, where America’s strength is to be found, is by their massive defense budgets, but I ask you, is this profitable milking of our defense budgets really what wins wars? Think about it.
On the subject of America backing the Kurds, I suggest you read the update to the Kurd Turkey disguise that has been set, and read Ted Snider article “Pawns in the Game: A Brief History of America and the Kurds” posted on consortiumnews as of February 5th 2018. Also, see the link I left on the comment board referencing Tony Cartalucci’s article on the same subject. This most recent move by the U.S. via the useful idiot Kurds wraps up everything we are talking about here mijkmijld, and I hope you take away something from my link as you read it. Joe
New video just released: Hadi and The White Helmet Boys – Hero’s by Day, Terrorists by Night! Paid for with US and UK tax money. Hadi Abadallah, the White Helmets PR man goes into overdrive providing terrorist propaganda directly to corrupt western media outlets.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?time_continue=1&v=HIjne4Rwteo
Turns out the White Helmets are terrorists! Who’da thunk it?!!
Yeah, the NYT just added another warmonger to their staff (how many does that make now, over 20?)… name of Max. I would like to pick up the likes of him and Kristol, etc. that shout for more wars and toss them in the front line. That just might wipe those smirks off their faces.
That gets said a lot geeyp, but the more it gets said, ‘of how we should send the warmongers into battle’, is without a doubt a very good idea. I second your motion, and demand it be made policy as of yesterday and be implemented immediately like now. Joe
Amen, Joe.
Across the political spectrum from the most left to the most right every journalist and commentator treats the historical record wis disdain.
As I frequently post (apologies to those who have seen it) the United States of America dropped nuclear weapons on two cities full of innocent people on August 6 and 9 of 1945 – for purely political reasons – as the record shows. Form those days until today – with no end in sight – the United States has continued uninterrupted the slaughter around the globe of innocent people.
Yet we hear about Vietnam being a long war and Afghanistan being a long war but they are just the latest versions of the United States of America’s 7 decade policy of slaughter to achieve “Global full spectrum domination.”
It is clear the US is now justifying the repeat use of nuclear weapons against innocent people to subjugate the four remaining countries China, Russia, North Korea and Iran.
As the new strategy clearly states, “terrorism” and little wars in the Middle East are the least of our problems – we have much bigger wars ahead.
Yeah, Mattis the “mad dog” needs more money to “compete”. He wants his lethal capacities to be even more “lethal.” And my, what dead soulless eyes that hideous creature hides behind.
Your comment is historically inaccurate.
“the United States of America dropped nuclear weapons on two cities full of innocent people on August 6 and 9 of 1945″
Hiroshima and Nagasaki were bedrocks of Imperial Japan’s military machine.
Also, the units responsible for the rape of Nanjing, China, were based in Hiroshima.
What an excellent summary of where we find ourselves today. We must rein in our MIC, remodel our MSM propaganda/entertainment complex, and break our so-called Intelligence Agencies into 1000 pieces if we are to have any hope of redeeming ourselves. Settling for the “lesser of evils” is no longer an option. The power structures must be changed, and our evil leaders must be brought to justice. I am afraid that it will take some kind of major global disaster before the survivors finally realize that we all inhabit this small planet together. We must learn to wage peace and no longer trod the road to Armageddon. I pray for the collective soul of mankind. Thank you Coleen Rowley and Robert Wing for this superb article, and for all the work you do to promote truth and peace.
Well said.
You can’t have any discussion about war and peace as long as the deep state and their vassals in the MSM control the narrative. The horrors of war are now sanitized into kind of monster video game where the innocent civilians murdered, maimed and terrorized are never seen. Even the American soldiers (very few) who do get killed during combat are hidden away from public view. war is glorified in films with hero’s winning the day and saving some non entity from the jaws of the terrible enemy. We should also not forget that war is good for the arms business which is currently America’s main export. It says in the bible some where, there will be wars and wars and rumors of wars until the end of the world.
I remember as a child growing up in Britain in the 1960s, BBC news showing footage from Vietnam, of US planes dropping bombs, of helicopters flying low over forest areas, of US soldiers running on the ground. I vividly remember the vietcong guy in handcuffs being shot dead in the head by a south Vietnamese officer, of footage of the Mi Lai massacre. Of course at the time, Britain had wisely refused to ally the US in any actual fighting there. But over the last few years, I have seen nothing like the same amount of footage on the news of the war in Afghanistan (other than when the Windsor spare was there). Most of the footage from Syria is of the alleged bombing atrocities of the Russians and the ‘barrel-bombs’ of Assad.
Maybe this modern propaganda by omission is why there is less opposition to US adventures in Afghanistan than Vietnam?
John A – I very much agree with your assessment of war coverage. I think that our (U.S.) elites realized that it was a mistake to allow the American public to witness the actually brutality of war on their TV sets in Vietnam. Since as basically decent human beings (even though highly propagandized) Americans would not be able to continue to justify such inhumane mayhem indefinitely. Thus we got instead “embedded” journalists, and sanitized reporting on war minus most importantly the video of our victim’s suffering. Without actually seeing examples of that suffering it is much easier for Americans to assume that what we are told about the righteousness of our cause is correct, and that of course we hold to only the highest standards in protecting the human rights of civilians. A measure of how highly propagandized Americans are is that no one blinked when Madeline Albright justified the U.S. sponsored death of a half a million Iraqi children on national television, but at the same time we’re supposed to believe our oligarchs and their minions feel heartfelt concern for civilians if that civilian is killed by one of our chosen enemies, ex. Libyan, Syrian, Iranian, etc. etc. Sadly, I think this article paints an all too accurate picture of the America and Americans I know and their relationship to our endless immoral wars.
I grew up in the US and during dinner we were treated to the horrors of the ‘Nam along with our pot roast while watching the news on TV. They showed the ‘Nam to show Americans were ‘winning’ even though they were losing. They learned their lessons well. Now nary a mention of war or during action last decade they made sure it was kiddo friendly G rated fare. No wonder folks don’t care. They don’t know the horrors unleashed by armed forces because it’s censored so well these days.
“How much longer before, finally, we can no longer pretend not to notice the taste of poison in this recipe concocted to make war palatable?”
We will all notice big time when either our side or the other launches its nuclear arsenal out of hubris, paranoia or mistake. The leaders of all our key sectors, including political, legal, military, mass communication, education and so forth, who are not pathologically delusional must know that our current confrontation with the world, especially the hybrid wars directed at Russia, China, Iran and North Korea, represents a metastable state which cannot persist indefinitely. Our poisonous relationship with the world has been deliberately boobytrapped with a multitude of trip wires any one of which will lead to global thermonuclear war if purposely or accidentally triggered. What moral rational person would allow that condition to persist? No populace should stand for such a mentality in its leadership.
Yet we willingly trudge towards our doom, like sheep after a Judas goat.
Whether or not the end is nuclear war, the failure of US democracy due to control of elections and mass media by money, and the resulting gang operation we call government, will lead through war to the destruction of the United States. It may be economic destruction leading to civil war, but certainly we “trudge towards our doom.”
Sometimes I think the rest of the world is nervously watching and waiting for America to finally crumble. We are out of control and dangerous, and no one seems to be running the show. We’ve allowed the creation of a gigantic machine that benefits a small number and spreads chaos throughout the world. Our political system serves this machine. Meanwhile, we allow institutions that benefit the average citizen to be bled dry. It’s unstoppable, but it can’t last. It’s all going to come crashing down some day.
The question is whether or not the US will start nuclear war as it declines thinking – all or nothing for civilization. Thinking they can “win.”
Given that the US used two nuclear weapons on cities full of innocent people – for purely political not military reasons – and the historical record which clearly shows that the US has not stopped being at war ever sense, killing DAY IN AND DAY OUT every day for over 73 years.
Given this record of the sustained slaughter of innocent people over decades no one should think that another use of nuclear weapons by the US is not a very real possibility.
Your comment is inaccurate.
“the US used two nuclear weapons on cities full of innocent people – for purely political not military reasons
Hiroshima and Nagasaki were bedrocks of Imperial Japan’s military machine.
Also, the units responsible for the rape of Nanjing, China, were based in Hiroshima.
I wonder, too.
Do European leaders collude secretly to gain enough strength to be independent of America and walk with our heads up?
Ask Nicholas Sarkozy:
https://algeriepart.com/2017/11/01/guerre-libye-livre-revele-liens-entre-sarkozy-largent-de-kadhafi/
Toutes les guerres menent a Calais!
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2018/feb/03/border-treaty-migrant-surge-calais-violence
Ask David Cameron:
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2016/sep/14/mps-deliver-damning-verdict-on-camerons-libya-intervention
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2016/09/13/david-camerons-ill-conceived-libya-war-led-to-rise-of-islamic-st/
Vivent les droits de l’homme, n’est-ce pas?!
The countries of the world need to stand up to the USA. When they show collective action it demonstrates to America that they have the strength to resist pressure. And it needs to happen more often. This is what occurred at the UN when 128 countries voted for the resolution to “recognize Jerusalem as the capital of Israel as null and void.” Prior to the vote the US threatened and tried to blackmail nations to vote against the resolution. In response, Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdo?an said “I call on the whole world: Don’t you dare sell your democratic struggle and your will for petty dollars” and warned Trump that “he cannot buy Turkey’s democratic will with his dollars.” He added: “I hope and expect the US won’t get the result it expects from there (UN) and the world will give a very good lesson to the United States”.
The rabid reaction of Ambassador Haley and President Trump demonstrates the power nations have when united on issues. American allies have to stop being the finger puppets of the US. The leaders of the world’s nations need to make it clear they will no longer support America’s regime change wars, pointless sanctions, intimidation and occupation of countries and denounce the farcical and false justifications, such as “war on terror”, “against America’s interests”, and “national security threat” repeated ad nauseum.
The 21st century should be the start of the Age of Diplomacy. The world needs a new paradigm; a shift away from the cold wars and a unipolar order. The USA is not the Supreme Leader of planet Earth. Nations need to work collectively and cooperatively with each other and resolve issues through negotiation, mutual respect and collaboration of ideas.
Very nice summary of the situation.