War
is
the business of the state. That
can be read in more than one way.
Back in the 17th and 18th
centuries, many wars were the work
of mercenaries and
mercenary-captains, often serving,
more or less, nobility who thought
they could supplant the king or
queen, or expand their own turf
and power, pursuing plunder all
the while. People gave their
support to strong leaders and
nation-states partly because they
were tired of constant warfare and
being the victims of mercenaries.
In the 18th century, war was said
to be “enlightened” because it
largely didn’t impact the people
directly; warfare was “limited” to
otherwise under-employed nobility
and the so-called dregs of
society. And nation-states
profited from being able to
control warfare.
The
French Revolution and Napoleon unleashed a
new phase of increasingly unlimited war
inspired by ideology (Liberty! Fraternity!
Equality!). Nationalism was heavily
tapped. Soldiers were told it was an honor
to die for the nation-state rather than
for plunder or in the service of some
minor nobleman. Sweet and fitting it
seemed to die for one’s country, so
soldiers were told — and are still told to
this day.
Nowadays,
war is the business of the state may be
taken literally with war as business. The
U.S. federal government spends more than
half of its discretionary budget on the
military, weaponry, and war, though it’s
disguised as a “defense” budget. As long
as war remains a business for the U.S.,
and as long as people are profiting from
it, not just in monetary terms but in
terms of power, war will remain supreme in
U.S. foreign policy.
I
remember reading a newspaper from the
1930s that stated clearly that the way to
end war was to remove the profit motive.
That same decade, the U.S. Senate held
hearings to expose the “merchants of
death,” the military contractors that had
profited so greatly from wholesale death
and destruction during World War I. Since
the U.S. in those days didn’t have a large
standing military and a vast array of
private military contractors, those
hearings could go ahead in a nation that
sought to avoid another world war,
especially yet another one in Europe.
Today,
the U.S. routinely wages war couched as
ever in terms of peace or, if not peace,
then security for America. How America is
made more secure by troops in Syria
helping to facilitate the seizing of oil,
or troops in Africa engaging in the latest
scramble for that continent’s natural
resources, is left undefined. Or perhaps
there is a tacit definition: if war is
business, America needs (and deserves)
access to the best markets, to vital
natural resources, to oil and lithium and
similar strategic materials, and the way
to secure those is militarily, using
force.
One thing
that amazes me, though it shouldn’t, is
the almost complete lack of emphasis in
the U.S. on conservation, on limiting
resource extraction by cutting demand. Oil
companies are bragging how they’re
boosting fossil fuel production in the
U.S. The message is clear: keep consuming!
No need to cut back on your use of fossil
fuels. Your overlords will secure — and
sell at inflated prices — the fuel you
need and want. Just don’t ask any
uncomfortable questions.
I suppose
it’s all quite simple (and depressing) in
its obviousness:
War is
the business of the state.
The
business of America is business.
The
business of America is war.
The
nation-state was supposed to corral war,
to control it, to “enlighten” it by
keeping it limited, a sideshow. Yet war in
America has become unlimited, the main
show, and very much unenlightened as well.
Corralling and controlling it is out of
favor. Planning for the next big war is
all the rage, perhaps most clearly with
China, though Russia factors in as well. A
new cold war wins nods of approval from
America’s national security state because
it most certainly means job security and
more power for those who are part of that
state.
What is
to be done? America needs to remember that
war is not the health of any democracy,
and that no democracy can survive when
it’s constantly engaged in war and
preparations for the same. Yet we know
America isn’t a democracy, so that
argument is effectively moot. Perhaps
homespun wisdom can help: those who live
by the sword (or the gun) die by the same,
though the American response would seem to
be: I’ll just buy more swords (or guns),
so take that. Or maybe an appeal to
Christianity and how blessed the
peacemakers are, and how Christ was the
prince of peace, except Americans prefer a
warrior-Christ who favors his chosen with
lawyers, guns, and money.
