As the
drumbeat intensifies for what might turn out to be anything but a «splendid little war»
against North Korea, it is appropriate to take stock of the ongoing, seemingly
successful effort to strip President Donald Trump of his authority to make any
foreign and national security policies that fly against the wishes of the
so-called Military-Industrial Complex, or MIC. A Google search for
«Military-Industrial Complex» (in quotation marks) with «Trump» yields almost
450,000 hits from all sources and almost 26,000 from just news sources.
During the
2016 campaign and into the initial weeks of his administration, Trump was
sometimes described as a threat to the MIC. But
over time, with the appointment to his administration of more generals and
establishment figures (including some allegedly tied to George Soros) while purging Trump loyalists,
it’s no surprise that his policies increasingly seem less a departure from
those of previous administrations than a continuation of them (for example,
welcoming Montenegro into NATO). Some now say that Trump is the MIC’s best friend and
maybe always was.
There are
those who deny that the MIC exists at all. One self-described conservative
blogger writing in the pro-war, pro-intervention, and mostly
neoconservative National Review refers to the very existence of the
MIC as a «myth» peddled by the
«conspiracy-minded». Sure, it is conceded, it was appropriate to
refer to such a concept back when President Dwight Eisenhower warned
against it in 1961 upon his impending departure from the White
House, because back then the military consumed some 10 percent of the American
GDP. But now, when the percentage is nominally just 3.2 percent, less than $600
billion per year, the term supposedly is inapplicable. (There are those who
argue that the real cost annually is over $1
trillion, but why quibble.)
There is a
germ of truth contained in the reference to money. Compared to the «wars of choice» that
have characterized US global behavior since the end of the Cold War with the
Soviet Union, the MIC of the 1950s and 1960s was relatively less likely to
embark upon foreign military escapades. The existence of a world-class
nuclear-armed foe in the form of the USSR moderated tendencies toward
adventurism. The most serious «combat» the classic MIC preferred to engage in
was inter-service battles for budgetary bounty. Reportedly, once General Curtis
LeMay, head of the Air Force’s Strategic Air Command, was briefed by a junior
officer who repeatedly referred to the USSR as «the enemy». LeMay supposedly
interrupted to correct him: «Young man, the Soviet Union is our adversary. Our
enemy is the Navy».
But today
the «Military-Industrial Complex» is an archaic term that doesn’t begin to
describe the complexity and influence of current structures. Indeed, even in
Eisenhower’s day the MIC was more than a simple duplex consisting of the
Pentagon and military contractors but also included an essential third leg: the
Congressional committees that provide the money constituting the MIC’s
lifeblood. (Reportedly, an earlier draft of the speech used the term «military-industrial-Congressional» complex, a
fuller description of what has come to be called the «Iron Triangle». Asked
about the omission from the final text, Eisenhower is said to have answered: «It was
more than enough to take on the military and private industry. I couldn't take
on the Congress as well».)
Not only
did the Iron Triangle continue to expand during the Cold War, when production
of military hardware established itself as the money-making nucleus of the MIC,
it swelled to even greater proportions after the designated enemy, the USSR,
went out of business in 1991. While for one brief shining moment there was
naïve discussion of a «Peace Dividend» that would provide relief for American
taxpayers from whose shoulders the burden of a «long twilight struggle» against
communism (in John Kennedy’s phrase) had been lifted, that notion faded
quickly. Instead, not only did the «hard» side of the MIC maintain itself –
first in Iraq to fight «naked aggression» by Saddam Hussein in Kuwait,
then in the Balkans in the 1990s as part of NATO’s determination to go «out of area or out of business»
– it then branched out into «soft» areas of control.
In the past
quarter century what began as Eisenhower’s MIC has become a multifaceted,
hybrid entity encompassing an astonishing range and depth in both the public and
private sectors. To a large extent, the contours of what former Congressional
staffer Mike Lofgren has called the «Deep
State» (which largely through Lofgren’s efforts has since become a
household word) are those of the incestuous «expert» community that dominates
mainstream media thinking but extend beyond it to include elements of all three
branches of the US government, private business (especially the financial industry,
government contractors, information technology), think tanks, NGOs (many of
which are anything but «nongovernmental» but are funded by US official agencies and those
of our «allies», satellites, and clients), higher education (especially the
recipients of massive research grants from the Department of Defense), and the
two political parties and their campaign operatives, plus the multitude of
lobbyists, campaign consultants, pollsters, spin doctors, media wizards,
lawyers, and other functionaries.
Comparing
the MIC of 1961 to its descendant, the Deep State of today, is like comparing a
horse and buggy to a Formula One racecar. The Deep State’s principals enjoy
power and privileges that would have brought a blush to the cheeks of members
of the old Soviet nomenklatura, of which it is
reminiscent.
Indeed, the
Deep State’s creepy resemblance to its late Soviet counterpart is manifest in
its budding venture into the realm of seeking to brand domestic American
dissent as treason, to the hearty approval of the loony Left.
As described by Daniel McAdams of the Ron Paul
Institute for Peace and Prosperity:
‘The
government would never compile, analyze, and target private news outlets
just because they deviate from the official neocon Washington line.
‘Perhaps
not yet. But some US government funded «non-governmental» organizations are
already doing just that.
‘The German
Marshall Fund has less to do with Germany these days than it did when founded
after WWII as a show of appreciation for the US Marshall Fund. These days it’s
mostly funded by the US government, allied
governments (especially in the Russia-hating Baltics), neocon grant-making
foundations, and the military-industrial complex. Through its strangely
Soviet-sounding »Alliance for Securing Democracy» project it has launched
something called «Hamilton 68: A New Tool to Track
Russian Disinformation on Twitter».
‘This
project monitors 600 Twitter accounts
that the German Marshall Fund claims are «accounts that are involved in
promoting Russian influence and disinformation goals». Which accounts does this
monitor? It won’t tell us. How does it choose which ones to monitor? It won’t
tell us. To what end? Frighteningly, it won’t tell us.
‘How ironic
that something called the German Marshall Fund is bringing Stasi-like tactics
to silence alternative media and opinions in the United States!’
The
Soviet nomenklatura gave up without a fight. It’s unlikely its
American counterpart will. Whether Trump in the end decides to fight or to seek
accommodation is still under debate. Some suggest that by signing the recent
bill imposing sanctions on Russia, Iran, and North Korea, he has already
surrendered. But either way, war or not, things are going to get very rocky.
