{"id":48245,"date":"2024-06-20T12:37:43","date_gmt":"2024-06-20T20:37:43","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.antiwar.com\/blog\/?p=48245"},"modified":"2024-06-20T12:37:43","modified_gmt":"2024-06-20T20:37:43","slug":"the-heretics-global-dominance-at-any-price","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.antiwar.com\/blog\/2024\/06\/20\/the-heretics-global-dominance-at-any-price\/","title":{"rendered":"The Heretics: Global Dominance at Any Price"},"content":{"rendered":"

Reprinted from Bracing Views<\/a> with the author\u2019s permission.<\/i><\/p>\n

American foreign policy remains in the grip of heretics. They believe that the Prince of Peace is actually a god of war. They believe America is strengthened by entangling alliances (think here of our so-called alliance with Israel). They believe in constant war as a recipe both for dominant power and greater freedom and democracy throughout the world. They believe that spending roughly a trillion dollars each year on weapons and war is a wise \u201cinvestment.\u201d And they believe they are the toughest and truest of patriots, the ones who see further, the ones with the guts to get things done, no matter how poorly America\u2019s wars have gone from Korea and Vietnam through Afghanistan, Iraq, and today\u2019s proxy wars.<\/p>\n

There used to be a different America, a much less militaristic and bellicose one. The American tradition is rich and complex; it contains multitudes, as Walt Whitman might say. Why are we so stuck on warmongers, thieves, and vainglorious simps of empire?<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

As an American, I\u2019m very much a part of my country\u2019s complexity and richness. And the America that speaks to me contains elements and lessons such as these:<\/p>\n

George Washington\u2019s prescient warning about the dangers of entangling alliances<\/a> with foreign powers.<\/p>\n

James Madison\u2019s warning that constant warfare is the direst of enemies<\/a> of liberty, freedom, and democracy in America.<\/p>\n

General Smedley Butler\u2019s confession that \u201cwar is a racket<\/a>\u201d and that he had often served as a \u201cgangster for capitalism.\u201d<\/p>\n

The Nye Commission in the U.S. Senate that investigated arms manufacturers and weapons makers as \u201cMerchants of Death<\/a>\u201d that profited greatly from war.<\/p>\n

President Dwight D. Eisenhower\u2019s \u201ccross of iron\u201d speech and his warning about the growing power and insidious nature of the military-industrial complex<\/a>.<\/p>\n