While we are kept focused on terrorism both abroad and at home, there is I believe, a deeper reason why our country continues to engage in war. It goes beyond imperialism, beyond fighting terrorism, beyond even an uncontrollable thirst for oil. I suggest the United States and its citizens have become addicted to war. We have become economically, culturally, and psychologically addicted.
We may deny it. But let’s look at the evidence.
Economic addiction
Our economy, to a huge extent, depends upon military expenditures. Straight up, as expressed in the United States budget for 2007, the Department of Defense (A euphemism for what used to be called the War Department.) appropriation is $439.3 billion. However, this does not include that portion of the Department of Energy budget devoted to developing and maintaining our nuclear capability nor does it include the cost of caring for the veterans of our wars in the Veteran’s Administration budget, nor does it include the direct appropriations for the Afghanistan and Iraq wars; this total is about 626.1 billion dollars. All this money, of course creates jobs as it did in Hitler’s Germany. All of these expenditures ripple through the economy providing jobs and income for all kinds of businesses from grocery stores to small tangential manufacturers. I have yet to find a study tracing all the economic implications of the military budget. I think it would show we are far more dependent upon the military than we think we are. To get a feel for the implications of this kind of influence it is useful to think of what our society would look and feel like if those expenditures were directed to the environmental, educational, and social necessities of the United States and the world. All people engaged in such efforts could believe they were contributing to a better world instead of hiding out from the terrorists we continue to produce. Considerations of this sort come closer to getting at the true cost of militarism.
Cultural addiction:
Sixty-six years (1941 to 2007) of a standing army have had deep cultural effects. One study has indicated that the military is the most trusted institution of our society. See a series of recent polls at http://www.pollingreport.com/institut.htm; this despite the distrust of many of the Founding Fathers. A fundamental concern of the Constitutional Convention was the existence of a standing army. The following is from the manual of the U. S. Army Officer Candidate School. “In the Constitutional Convention, there was still traditional fear of a standing army, which excited the opponents of a strong government. In truth, the military clauses of the Constitution follow a cautious compromise course between the hopes of those who favored greater military strength and the fears of those who anticipated a military despotism.”
Popular culture has, through advertising, become a significant influence on young people. In 2006 the military had an advertising and recruitment budget of 1.4 billion dollars. Thus you see frequent ads of tanks galloping over terrain and technological whiz-bang combat environments directed at young people. The Army even has an online videogame (http://www.americasarmy.com/) introducing young people to war and combat. The Marines have an auxiliary called the Young Marines who are clothed in combat fatigues and boots and carry simulated rifles all in the stated interest of developing their character. One can become a Young Marine at age eight. This, I suggest, is pernicious cultural penetration of the worst form, reminding one of the Hitler Youth.
Psychological addiction:
Kurt Vonnegut wrote a piece in 1983 titled The Worst Addiction of Them All. In it he compared the addiction of what he called “war preparers” to that of alcohol and gambling addicts. There is a psychological rush as a new war is prepared for. Barbara Tuchman, in her book on Europe preceding World War I noted that English and German university students in their get-togehers openly acknowledged that they would likely be going to war with each other and viewed it as a great adventure. This nation has been kept on the edge of war or at war for over sixty years. I suggest it has become addicted to the continuing excitement as demonstrated in the best selling videogames.
Some time ago I saw a documentary about a coffee farmer in Africa. He had hired a local tribe to harvest his coffee. However, the men of the tribe soon found cause to go to war with an adjacent tribe leaving the women to (disgustedly) pick the coffee. The documentary showed the men chasing each other with spears in the presence of the women picking coffee. There were deaths involved.
I mention these to illustrate the profound human compulsion for war. However, this inclination has been amplified by technology and in the United States, as earlier in various European countries, by a lust for empire. Initially it did not seem so. Our infant nation had suffered enough at the hands of the British Empire. Washington warned against foreign entanglements. But as population increased and greed found fertile ground in the wilderness to the west we manufactured the myth of Manifest Destiny and set about decimating the indigenous peoples. It did not look like imperialism because it was done within our own self-declared borders. However within thirty five years of the country’s founding we promulgated the Monroe Doctrine by which the countries of the world were notified that we would not tolerate their colonialism in the western hemisphere, in effect declaring the whole hemisphere our colony. We were off to the imperial races. In that short a time we had forgotten what the Founding Fathers understood so well.
What to do? Kurt Vonnegut states that we as a nation should do as alcoholics and gamblers do as the first stage of recovery. We need to admit that we have this addiction. As part of thi, I think the history books we require our children to read should demonstrate the honesty of Howard Zinn’s People’s History of the United States. We should insist on honesty in our media. We should begin to use our resources to improve the lot of mankind, which is the best defense any nation can deploy. Can this be done to any effective extent? After World War II the United States, understanding that World War II was a consequence of the deprivations that the Treaty of Versailles ending World War I imposed upon the German people, created the Marshall Plan. We saw the need for a world body representing all peoples of the world, hence the United Nations. In doing these things we were acknowledging the earlier mistakes. The time is long overdue when we should undertake the same reassessment regarding our propensity toward war.
Bob Newhard
No comments:
Post a Comment