So much of what our country does has a focus on war. War is a way of thinking, being, believing and speaking. Generals have unthinkable power and control over the resources of our nation. We don’t talk about it, our national conversation never addresses the largest of elephants-in-the room and that is the war machine that lives in the world’s wealthiest nation, America.
It is the easiest trap to fall into and that is: groupthink. To be part of the group, you must think the same and agree with the same beliefs. For the war machine those beliefs include a “never enough” strategy. A willingness to commit deep crimes to convince America that there is this need for evermore money to commit to the deep hole that is the war machine.
There is no threat to the United States that could not be eradicated by the United States, in less than two minutes. And yet, we continue to send good men and women to their deaths in all corners of the world. Make no mistake about it, war is profitable, and nothing stops change faster than the mighty dollar in the U.S.
We have enough nuclear weapons to annihilate the possibility of living on planet earth. No country comes even, a little bit close, to our power in weaponry and killing machines.
We don’t need to continue to live the dream of World War II. We don’t need human beings to be cannon fodder anymore. We are smarter and we are stronger than that.
The problem is, the Pentagon. The powerful will not relinquish an inch of power. Neither will the wealthy war contractors, those who manufacture tanks and rifles and rations, they will not give up the gravy train. Without the sale of war as a good cause to the American people, war would not be possible. Currently we idolize warriors and this is a very good thing. We are taking care of soldiers who have been damaged by the war machine. It would be more than painful to tell these brave humans that the sacrifice was to profit rather than to country. That doesn’t mean that we should continue to validate a need for war. We do not need a war, we do not have a need for our sons and daughters to die.
Truly, can anyone name a reason why we have soldiers in the middle east? Are we saving American lives? Are we saving any lives? The product of war is death, there is no way around that fact. There is nothing that changes or rearranges that fact. War equates to death of the warriors and the innocent alike.
Think of those that manage the huge war machine in the U.S. It is the job of these to find threats to the United States. It is the job to construct an argument that justifies the expense of dollars and lives. It is the job of these to keep this war machine rolling forward and to keep increasing the expense, both in dollars and in lives.
What if we said no? No more war? What if the American people said, we do not want to continue our nation in this manner. What if we said not more war machine? We would require a scientific, meaning, a data- driven formulation of meaningful information. We would allow American mothers to have a vote, we would allow those who pay the price of war, not those who gain from war… to decide when and how to engage. We could engage without risk to humans and engage without risk to civilians.
What if we took the possibility of profit out of war? What if contractors had to complete the complex accounting that Medicaid contractors must complete? With the idea that auditors could come at any time and disallow expenses and therefor reduce the price of the product? What if you went to jail for profiting from war? What if you went to jail for being a war monger?
Let’s not associate war with the warrior. Let’s get out of group think and address war for what it really is: a living breathing threat to humanity and perverted profiteering for the few.