This book is an overview of America’s national security policies, why they are so bad, and why they must change. No matter who gets elected to office in the US Congress or the White House, things stay the same. In spite of consistent failures, things stay the same. This author argues that this must change – we need to stop our militaristic approach to the world, and fix what is wrong here at home. The book starts with this quote:
“Suffer us not to mock ourselves with falsehood.” – T. S. Eliot (1930)
This problem has been with us a LONG time. A critic of foreign policy from the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan, Roger Morris, had this to say:
“The lethal fault of American foreign policy is a matter of neither left nor right, neither liberal cowardice nor conservative conspiracy, but rather a relatively banal bipartisan mediocrity…… A loss of competence more than a loss of nerve, it is not different from nepotism and misrule in one’s country commission or school board, a decrepit commuter railroad or an expiring automobile manufacturer like Chrysler.”
And, from the viewpoint of the US Congress and the military-industrial complex, the aim was to make America “safe” by technological fundamentalism. In past years, the powers that be did not see the US implementing a policy of preventative war, so they saw their pursuit of nuclear dominance as a source of stability, along with military bases around the world. That the world might look on all this differently did not cross their minds. And so this monster grew and grew… and sucked up more and more money and effort. And any serious consideration of a different path was never considered.
Of course, the Iraq war was a “war of prevention” per Bush administration comments. In reality, it was a war of aggression.
One US Senator did speak out against the abuse of power. Senator Fulbright wrote a book called THE ARROGANCE OF POWER, which received little attention. He proposed that while America had good intentions, but problems developed when these good intentions were married to seemingly bottomless reserves of power. The result, he proposed, was self-delusion combined with a tendency to lose touch with reality. Since the time the country was founded, Americans have believed that we were God’s chosen ones to lead the world, and our immense power is a testimony to God’s favor on our country. Senator Fulbright asked:
“Who are the self-appointed emissaries of God who have wrought so much violence in the world? They are men with doctrines…. Who believe in some cause without doubt and practice their beliefs without scruple, men who cease to be human beings… and become instead living, breathing, embodiments of some faith or ideology.”
And the politicians set out on their self-appointed missions to police the world, and defeat all tyrannies, are less likely to advance the cause of peace then to wreck havoc, and bring misery and death to the intended beneficiaries. And, as a side note, though they would claim that “all options are on the table” the fact is that many options are not on the table at all – such as the option to not use violence or falsehoods to promote their cause. The USA is very much a militaristic and aggressive nation.
And the Presidents that we elect are charged with continuing this policy, while they had us a bunch of slop to make us accept this violence and aggression. Bush gave us 27 different reasons for invading Iraq and for continuing to occupy Iraq. Obama has surged three times in Afghanistan, while claiming that this war and occupation is necessary to defeat the “terrorists” even while they acknowledge that the terrorists who organized the attacks on the US on 9-11-01 are long gone from Afghanistan. And yet Obama still calls it a “war of necessity”.
Later in the book, this author points out that there is NO evidence that what the US has done in the world with our military has advanced the cause of global peace (he is referring to post WW2). Here are some steps that the author feels the US should take to correct our way of being in the world:
1) Recognize that the point of the US military is not to combat evil or remake the world, but to defend the United States.
2) The primary duty station of the American soldier is in America.
3) Force should be employed only as a last resort and only in self-defense.
Near the end of the book, the author points out that if the politicians in DC continue to follow these military and fiscal policies, then that is the fault of the American people. There is much, much more in the book and I do recommend it.
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