An important clarification of my piece on “The Imperial Class” posted this morning: the rank-and-file military are not automatically inducted into the ranks of the imperial class, and, indeed, their interests are diametrically opposed to the agenda of the War Party  and the military-industrial-congressional complex. That’s why we have seen some of the most persistent, and effective opposition to this administration’s Middle East project coming from the top ranks of the military, from generals who want to protect their soldiers — and the military machine they have built up into a peerless fighting force — from wanton destruction and useless sacrifice on the altar of the neocons’ vanity.
US soldiers are doing a job: protecting the country. The interventionists want to make their job 100 times harder — not only by invading every “enemy,” both real and imagined, in sight, but also by making the US itself more vulnerable by creating armies of anti-Americans eager to do us harm.
No wonder Ron Paul, the sole antiwar Republican presidential aspirant, received the largest amount of contributions from US military personnel, more than all the others combined.
