The US Military Is Everywhere

Stephanie Savell, Costs of War Project, originally published in the February issue of Smithsonian magazine (click for larger version)

Most Americans would say we have a military for national defense and security. But our military is not a defensive force. Defense is not its ethos, nor is it how our military is structured. Our military is a power-projection force. It is an offensive force. It is designed to take the fight to the enemy. To strike first, usually justified as “preemptive” or “preventive” action. It’s a military that believes “the best defense is a good offense,” with leaders who believe in “full-spectrum dominance,” i.e. quick and overwhelming victories, enabled by superior technology and firepower, whether on the ground, on the seas, in the air, or even in space or cyberspace.

Thus the “global war on terror” wasn’t a misnomer, or at least the word “global” wasn’t. Consider the article below today from TomDispatch.com by Stephanie Savell. Our military is involved in at least 80 countries in this global war, with no downsizing of the mission evident in the immediate future (perhaps, perhaps, a slow withdrawal from Syria; perhaps, perhaps, a winding down of the Afghan War; meanwhile, we hear rumblings of possible military interventions in Venezuela and Iran).

Here’s a sad reality: U.S. military troops and military contractors/weapons dealers have become America’s chief missionaries, our ambassadors, our diplomats, our aid workers, even our “peace” corps, if by “peace” you mean more weaponry and combat training in the name of greater “stability.”

We’ve become a one-dimensional country. All military all the time.

William J. Astore is a retired lieutenant colonel (USAF). He taught history for fifteen years at military and civilian schools and blogs at Bracing Views. He can be reached at wastore@pct.edu. Reprinted from Bracing Views with the author’s permission.

2 thoughts on “The US Military Is Everywhere”

  1. Dear Mr Astore and Ms Savell:

    Though educational and reassuring to the limited scarce minority of the citizenry—the general public, US taxpayers—who fund the unholy seemingly never-ending #USgovt militarism, #carnage and corporatism, who even read or hear about this esoteric research over the din and deluge of corporatist media (#rus-gate, #jussiesmollett, #racism, etc hysteria/pearl-clutching), your article and particularly the headline (“The US Military Is Everywhere”) does more to reassure the establishment militarist elites, their accountants, financial planners, investors, legion of union workers, and thousands of consultants that their business model of death and destruction is robust and healthy and under no threat of not delivering immense returns now and for the next decade or more.

    Your article does little to empower the citizenry to end the criminality; nonetheless, it is appreciated for the sunlight it provides during these dark times. Otherwise, the #USgovt would never have given your researches the ability to access or publish any of the information without being censored like hundreds of other publishers who have been recently and historically (eg: @CareyWedler et al).

    “Here’s a sad reality: U.S. military troops and military contractors/weapons dealers have become America’s chief missionaries, our ambassadors, our diplomats, our aid workers, even our “peace” corps, if by “peace” you mean more weaponry and combat training in the name of greater “stability.”

    We’ve become a one-dimensional country. All military all the time.”

    Indeed. You left out that the #USgovt military has also become our censors—from #govtschools, to hollywood, corporatist msm/press and to social media.


    Thank you for your work, nonetheless.

Comments are closed.