{"id":54254,"date":"2025-07-15T11:42:50","date_gmt":"2025-07-15T19:42:50","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.antiwar.com\/blog\/?p=54254"},"modified":"2025-07-15T11:42:50","modified_gmt":"2025-07-15T19:42:50","slug":"appeasing-the-military-industrial-complex","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.antiwar.com\/blog\/2025\/07\/15\/appeasing-the-military-industrial-complex\/","title":{"rendered":"Appeasing the Military-Industrial Complex"},"content":{"rendered":"

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

In an ever-changing world, the one constant in Universe USA is rising Pentagon budgets. For President Trump, a trillion-dollar war budget is something to crow about. Of course, it\u2019s sold as \u201cpeace through strength.\u201d For what is more peaceful than more weaponry, especially nuclear-tipped ICBMs and SLBMs?<\/p>\n

America is always arming, uparming, rearming for war allegedly to prevent war. The problem is arming for war usually leads to yet more war. You don’t “invest” in weaponry to keep it on a shelf, rusting away in armories.<\/p>\n

Excuse my language, but Vietnam vets and war protesters put it well: Fighting (or bombing) for peace is like fucking for virginity.<\/p>\n

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Vintage 1969. Makes sense, right?<\/p><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/figure>\n<\/div>\n

More telling, however, is the constant state of war preparations that infect and influence our minds. Our “leaders” talk about “all options being on the table” when the only option they consider is military force. We are what we “invest” in. And weapons ‘r’ us.<\/p>\n

In U.S. politics, strong and wrong is seen as far better than \u201cweak\u201d and right. And just about every politician inside the DC Beltway appeases the military-industrial complex, Israel, or both. That\u2019s how you end up with disastrous wars of choice in Vietnam, Afghanistan, Iraq, and elsewhere, together with full-throated support for genocide in Gaza.<\/p>\n

Who cares about right and wrong when might always makes right?<\/p>\n

An anecdote: I have a friend who works in the belly of the beast (the DoD). He told me his job makes him think of Winston Smith in George Orwell\u2019s 1984<\/em>. The Pentagon under Pete Hegseth has become an exercise in eliminating DEI bad speak and replacing it with doubleplusgood warrior-ethos speak. Lots of time is wasted sending “bad” terms and names down the memory hole.<\/p>\n

Even as the DoD\u2019s language is purged of bad speak about DEI, the Pentagon\u2019s embrace of a permanent war economy is tightened. The very idea of a \u201cpeace dividend,\u201d floated by Republican President George H.W. Bush in the aftermath of the Soviet Union\u2019s collapse, is seemingly ancient history, an idea never to be considered again, not in Trump and Hegseth\u2019s warrior-USA.<\/p>\n

Preparing constantly for war is a powerful way to ensure more war. Overspending on esoteric and genocidal weaponry is a powerful way to hollow out one\u2019s country while establishing the conditions for global mass death.<\/p>\n

Perhaps our \u201cleaders\u201d need to recall that Orwell\u2019s 1984<\/em> was meant to be a warning of what to avoid, not a how-to guide for authoritarian rule and perpetual war.<\/p>\n

William J. Astore, a retired lieutenant colonel (USAF), professor of history, and a senior fellow at the Eisenhower Media Network (EMN), an organization of critical veteran military and national security professionals. His personal substack is Bracing Views<\/a>.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Reprinted from Bracing Views with the author\u2019s permission. In an ever-changing world, the one constant in Universe USA is rising Pentagon budgets. For President Trump, a trillion-dollar war budget is something to crow about. Of course, it\u2019s sold as \u201cpeace through strength.\u201d For what is more peaceful than more weaponry, especially nuclear-tipped ICBMs and SLBMs? […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":290,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_seopress_robots_primary_cat":"none","_seopress_titles_title":"","_seopress_titles_desc":"","_seopress_robots_index":"","_et_pb_use_builder":"","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[],"coauthors":[758],"class_list":["post-54254","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"meta_box":{"disable_donate_message":"","custom_donate_message":"","subtitle":"Orwell's 1984<\/I> Wasn't Meant As a How-To Guide"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.antiwar.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/54254","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.antiwar.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.antiwar.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.antiwar.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/290"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.antiwar.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=54254"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/www.antiwar.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/54254\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":54261,"href":"https:\/\/www.antiwar.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/54254\/revisions\/54261"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.antiwar.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=54254"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.antiwar.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=54254"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.antiwar.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=54254"},{"taxonomy":"author","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.antiwar.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/coauthors?post=54254"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}