Good Monday morning, Fellow Seekers,
Following up on the Pasquino-Frank Rich post of yesterday, the term “military-industrial complex,” (coined by the way, by future University of Minnesota President Malcolm Moos) occurred in this passage of President Dwight D. Eisenhower’s farewell address, Jan. 17, 1961:
“Until the latest of our world conflicts, the United States had no armaments industry. American makers of plowshares could, with time and as required, make swords as well. But now we can no longer risk emergency improvisation of national defense. We have been compelled to create a permanent armaments industry of vast proportions. Added to this, three and a half million men and women are directly engaged in the defense establishment. We annually spend on military security more than the net income of all United States corporations.
The conjunction of an immense military establishment and a large arms industry is new in the American experience. The total influence — economic, political, even spiritual –is felt in every city, every Statehouse, every office of the federal government. We recognize the imperative need for this development. Yet we must not fail to comprehend its grave implications. Our toil, resources and livelihood are all involved; so is the very structure of our society.
In the councils of government, we must guard against the acquisition of unwarranted influence, whether sought or unsought, by the MILITARY-INDUSTRIAL complex. The potential for the disastrous rise of misplaced power exists and will persist.”
Eisenhower was uniquely positioned to issue this warning, as a retired five-star general, war hero, business-friendly Republican, fiscal conservative, and a man offering his last official advice to the nation after eight-years as commander-in-chief at the height of the Cold War.
He was also picking up a guns-vs.-butter theme he had laid down at the beginning of his presidency, in an April 16, 1953 speech to the American Society of Newspaper Editors, he said that a constant arms buildup would produce:
“a life of perpetual fear and tension; a burden of arms draining the wealth and the labor of all peoples; a wasting of strength that defies the American system or the Soviet system or any system to achieve true abundance and happiness for the people of this earth.
Every gun that is made, every warship launched, every rocket fired signifies, in the final sense, a theft from those who hunger and are not fed, those who are cold and are not clothed.
This world in arms is spending the sweat of its laborers, the genius of its scientists, the hopes of its children.
The cost of one modern heavy bomber is this: a modern brick school in more than thirty cities. It is two electric power plants, each serving a town of sixty thousand population. It is two fine, fully equipped hospitals. It is some fifty miles of concrete highway.
We pay for a single fighter plane with a half million bushels of wheat. We pay for a single destroyer with new homes that could have housed more than eight thousand people.
This is not a way of life at all, in any true sense. Under the cloud of threatening war, it is humanity hanging from a cross of iron.
If you’d like to see and hear Eisenhower deliver the speech, youtube has it here:
Eisenhower wanted to say “military-industrial-congressional complex” but struck “congressional” in deference to current legislators: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Military-industrial_complex
I remember when that warning was issued. It made sense then and it makes sense now.
The problem is to steer a path between becoming a warring nation and being a ripe fruit open for easy picking by the envious who would seize it. The first duty of the national government remains the protection of its people from outside threats.
The huge cutbacks after the first world war left us ill prepared for the fight for our lives and way of life that the late thirties brought, as a result of the unjust peace that was structured.
The cold war after the second world war prevented this for a time, but at the price Eisenhower feared and predicted.
But Reagan showed that a timely buildup could have the effect of forcing a threatening enemy to its knees (though Putin now says he’s building new weapons again).
And Vietnam and Al Qaida both have illustrated that the inability to counter our massive military power does not mean a world free of opposition.
All that we need is:
POLITICAL LEADERSHIP able to view our current situation with eyes that can see through the fog of big financial contributions and entrenched lobbyists,
and can see the difference between defending ourselves and our interests and engaging in “we can, so we will, throw our weight around”,
and can resist the urge to become the policeman of the world;
A MILITARY able to see the need to alter our mix of “defensive” tools to fight tomorrow’s battles instead of the battles of the past,
and able to rise above the tendency to delight in the latest toys to purchase what we really may need,
and able to see beyond the status quo (so enticing — no need to rethink anything) to the fast changing world around us,
and able to honestly express itself to the Commander in Chief when strong pressure is mounted to obtain its consent;
A WAR MACHINE capable of rising above it’s own self interest to turn to other products when the need for new weapons subsides;
And a PEOPLE willing to step away from silly pollyanna views of the sixties,
and willing to back away from the equally dangerous “if they don’t like it, blow ‘em up” tendencies of the triumphalists among us.
Unfortunately, as I contemplate this hoped for scenario, it looks more like a utopia than a possible reality.
I can only hope that our American way of dealing with stuff like this will once again prevail, and we will go bouncing back and forth from one extreme to another, with great hue and cry on all sides, and somehow we will survive.
One sad thing, though: even if all weapons were laid aside, that would NOT mean money was spent for the feeding of the hungry, the housing of the students, or any of the other good things that require another, and completely different consensus.