The rant over at Erigo Abyssus is against the bloated size of the federal bureaucracy. Here the rant is about a great danger facing the republic: The partnership between the Dept. of Defense and its arms suppliers.
Some background: The United States Dept. of Defense (DOD) is responsible for slightly fewer than 1.5 million active-duty military personnel, and about 1.1 million personnel in reserve components. In addition, it has over 950,000 civilian employees. Of the active-duty military personnel, approximately 300,000 are deployed in foreign countries around the world. The proposed DOD budget for fiscal year 2011 is $708 billion. To put this figure in perspective, it is only slightly smaller than the infamous 2009 $900-billion stimulus bill.
Up until 1947, we had a War Department. The National Security Act of 1947 renamed it the Department of Defense. But isn't that a misnomer? If it really was a defense department, there would not be 300,000 troops around the world. We should think about changing the name back to the War Department, or even better, bring home all those troops. Unfortunately, bringing home the troops is as unlikely as the federal government cutting spending.
Since 1947 the U.S. has been driven into wars and conflicts by the collusion of the military and the private defense companies that make the weapons and equipment the military depends on, and the sale of which those companies depend on. It is a symbiotic relationship. Just the three largest defense contractors, Lockheed Martin, Northrop Grumman and Boeing, derive from U.S. defense contracting a combined total revenue of billions of dollars ($100 billion in 2001) and employ hundreds of thousands (400,000 in 2001). That doesn't include arms sales to foreign countries.
It has been said that war is big business, and that certainly is apparent. President Eisenhower, in the famous speech in 1961 in which he coined the term, "military-industrial complex," said
It is not surprising that the immense influence of this relationship between the military and industry leads to armed conflict. U.S. foreign policy, even if conducted by those with the best of intentions, cannot help but be influenced by the need for our defense contractors to build more weapons and war material, and therefore the need for the military to consume and expend those weapons and material. How else to keep the approximately 4 million defense contractor employees, military personnel and civilian defense employees working? How else to maintain the contribution of hundreds of billions of dollars to our gross domestic product (GDP)?
And we, the people, have to pay for it all, and not just defense-related activities, but entitlement programs that the federal government instituted. Together, defense and entitlements make up a large part of the huge federal debt. To pay for all that, taxes must go up, or the government must borrow the money or print it. If the money is borrowed, the interest to be paid amounts to new spending, and if it is printed, it devalues the dollar. Either event amounts to a tax on the people.
If the government can tax people without an act of Congress specifying the tax, then the government has abandoned the Constitution, and we no longer are free.
It should be obvious that in order to maintain our liberty the size and power of the federal government must be reduced and limited. But in the face of the vast scope and influence of the military-industrial complex, will it be possible to reduce the size of government, specifically, the Dept. of Defense, and limit its power? Not unless the people demand it.
Why do we just accept this? We are no longer the Americans who, as colonists of the British Empire, refused to accept unjust taxes and unjust government.
Some background: The United States Dept. of Defense (DOD) is responsible for slightly fewer than 1.5 million active-duty military personnel, and about 1.1 million personnel in reserve components. In addition, it has over 950,000 civilian employees. Of the active-duty military personnel, approximately 300,000 are deployed in foreign countries around the world. The proposed DOD budget for fiscal year 2011 is $708 billion. To put this figure in perspective, it is only slightly smaller than the infamous 2009 $900-billion stimulus bill.
Up until 1947, we had a War Department. The National Security Act of 1947 renamed it the Department of Defense. But isn't that a misnomer? If it really was a defense department, there would not be 300,000 troops around the world. We should think about changing the name back to the War Department, or even better, bring home all those troops. Unfortunately, bringing home the troops is as unlikely as the federal government cutting spending.
Since 1947 the U.S. has been driven into wars and conflicts by the collusion of the military and the private defense companies that make the weapons and equipment the military depends on, and the sale of which those companies depend on. It is a symbiotic relationship. Just the three largest defense contractors, Lockheed Martin, Northrop Grumman and Boeing, derive from U.S. defense contracting a combined total revenue of billions of dollars ($100 billion in 2001) and employ hundreds of thousands (400,000 in 2001). That doesn't include arms sales to foreign countries.
It has been said that war is big business, and that certainly is apparent. President Eisenhower, in the famous speech in 1961 in which he coined the term, "military-industrial complex," said
Our military organization today bears little relation to that known by any of my predecessors in peacetime, or indeed by the fighting men of World War II or Korea.
Until the latest of our world conflicts, the United States had no armaments industry. American makers of plowshares could, with time and as required, make swords as well. But now we can no longer risk emergency improvisation of national defense; we have been compelled to create a permanent armaments industry of vast proportions. Added to this, three and a half million men and women are directly engaged in the defense establishment. We annually spend on military security more than the net income of all United States corporations.
This conjunction of an immense military establishment and a large arms industry is new in the American experience. The total influence -- economic, political, even spiritual -- is felt in every city, every State house, every office of the Federal government. [emphasis mine.] We recognize the imperative need for this development. Yet we must not fail to comprehend its grave implications. Our toil, resources and livelihood are all involved; so is the very structure of our society.
In the councils of government, we must guard against the acquisition of unwarranted influence, whether sought or unsought, by the militaryindustrial 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.
It is not surprising that the immense influence of this relationship between the military and industry leads to armed conflict. U.S. foreign policy, even if conducted by those with the best of intentions, cannot help but be influenced by the need for our defense contractors to build more weapons and war material, and therefore the need for the military to consume and expend those weapons and material. How else to keep the approximately 4 million defense contractor employees, military personnel and civilian defense employees working? How else to maintain the contribution of hundreds of billions of dollars to our gross domestic product (GDP)?
And we, the people, have to pay for it all, and not just defense-related activities, but entitlement programs that the federal government instituted. Together, defense and entitlements make up a large part of the huge federal debt. To pay for all that, taxes must go up, or the government must borrow the money or print it. If the money is borrowed, the interest to be paid amounts to new spending, and if it is printed, it devalues the dollar. Either event amounts to a tax on the people.
If the government can tax people without an act of Congress specifying the tax, then the government has abandoned the Constitution, and we no longer are free.
It should be obvious that in order to maintain our liberty the size and power of the federal government must be reduced and limited. But in the face of the vast scope and influence of the military-industrial complex, will it be possible to reduce the size of government, specifically, the Dept. of Defense, and limit its power? Not unless the people demand it.
Why do we just accept this? We are no longer the Americans who, as colonists of the British Empire, refused to accept unjust taxes and unjust government.
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