Americans like to think of their country as different
from those run by military regimes. They are only fooling themselves. Ever
since the federal government was converted into a national-security state after
World War II (without a constitutional amendment authorizing the conversion),
it has been the Pentagon, the CIA, and the NSA that have run the government,
just like in countries governed by military dictatorships.
Oh sure, the façade is maintained — the façade that is
ingrained in all of us in civics or government classes in high school and
college: that the federal government is composed of three co-equal, independent
branches that are in charge of the government.
But just a façade. It’s fake. It’s a lie.
It’s true that the federal government used to consist
of three branches. But that quaint notion disintegrated when the federal
government was converted to what is known as a “national-security state” after
World War II. Even though it was done without a constitutional amendment, that
conversion effectively added a fourth branch of government to the federal
government — the national-security branch, which consists of the NSA, the CIA,
and the Pentagon.
The addition of that fourth branch fundamentally
altered the original three-branch concept, especially because the fourth branch
quickly became the most powerful branch. The reason is because ultimately
government is force, and the fourth branch is where the most force was
concentrated within the new, altered governmental structure.
As
law professor Michael Glennon has pointed out in his book National Security and Double Government, the
result is a federal government in which the military, the CIA, and the NSA are
in charge. They are the ones actually calling the shots. But they permit the
other three branches to maintain the façade that they are in charge, including
periodically going along with decisions in the other three branches to keep
Americans thinking that everything is the same as it always has been.
Consider the Pentagon’s and the CIA’s torture center,
prison, and kangaroo tribunal system at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba. They set that up
with the aim of establishing a place to hold people and do whatever they wanted
to them, without any judicial interference. Guantanamo was a dream-come-true
for the military and the CIA. Like most conservatives, they had long lamented
those “constitutional technicalities” that let people go free. If only America
stopped coddling criminals, we could finally establish order and stability in
our land. Guantanamo was going to be their showcase, their model for the United
States and the world for dealing with criminals.
That model, as we now know, entailed kidnappings,
bounties, torture, indefinite detention, no criminal defense attorneys, denial
of speedy trial, kangaroo military tribunals, use of hearsay evidence, use of
evidence acquired through torture, denial of due process of law, and other
violations of long-established criminal-justice procedures that stretch back to
Magna Carta in 1215.
Contrary to what the Pentagon and the CIA and their
acolytes within the mainstream press have long maintained, terrorism is a
criminal offense, not an act of war. If you don’t believe me, go look up the
U.S. Code. That’s where all federal crimes are listed. You’ll see that
terrorism is in fact a federal criminal offense.
Alternatively, go into any federal courtroom in the
land where a federal criminal prosecution for terrorism is being held. Ask the
judge why he’s hold such a trial. He will tell you that it’s because terrorism
is a federal criminal offense.
The Pentagon-CIA torture-prison-tribunal center in
Cuba didn’t change that fact. It simply meant that the CIA and the Pentagon
were now getting into the law-enforcement business, which would enable them to
punish people they were certain were guilty of terrorism.
Now, let’s turn to President Obama, the president who
vowed to shut down this Pentagon-CIA model torture-prison-military tribunal
facility. He made that vow at the very start of his presidency, if not before.
Obama was a two-term president. That meant 8 years in
office. When Obama left office, he still had not fulfilled his vow. The
Pentagon-CIA torture, indefinite detention, and kangaroo center at Guantanamo
was still open. It still is.
The reaction of Obama supporters and the mainstream
press? “Oh, poor President Obama. He meant well. He really wanted to shut down
Guantanamo. He just wasn’t able to pull it off before his 8-year term ended.”
What?
Hey, this guy was commander-in-chief. No, not of the
American people but of the federal government’s military and para-military
forces. That means that he is supposedly the head honcho. As such, he gives the
orders to everyone below him. In a military structure, the superior officer
gives the orders and the subordinate officers obey and carry out the orders.
That means that all that President Obama, as commander
in chief, had to do was issue an order to his military subordinates: “Close it
down. Now!”
But that’s not what happened. The Pentagon and the CIA
obviously would not let Obama issue that order. And he understood that if he
did, it was a virtual certainty that they wouldn’t have obeyed it.
Then what?
Some Obama supporters say it was all Congress’s fault
because Congress passed a law that forbade the president from bringing any
Gitmo prisoners to the continental United States.
But Obama is president. He could have vetoed that law.
And even if the veto was overridden, he didn’t have to bring any prisoners to
the United States. As commander-in-chief of the military and the CIA, he could
have simply said, “Close it down and release them all.”
After all, that’s how our regular constitutional
system — the one whose principles the CIA and the Pentagon rejected — works.
Government officials have to charge a person with a crime and try him within a
reasonable period of time or they are required to release him.
The real question is: Why was Congress so intent on
keeping Gitmo open, over the president’s objections? After all, keeping a U.S.
kidnapping-detention-torture-kangaroo tribunal center in place in a foreign
country, over the president’s vehement objections, is not the type of thing
that we would ordinarily expect from the elected representatives of the
American people.
There is only one explanation that makes sense: That
the national-security establishment told Congress that it wanted Gitmo to be
kept open. We know that the CIA has assets in the mainstream press. We know
they have assets in state and local governments, including police departments.
It would stand to reason they would have assets in Congress, ones that they can
call upon whenever necessary to protect the interests of the Pentagon, CIA, and
NSA.
And there is also the matter of military bases,
programs, and projects in the district of every member of Congress. Congressmen
knew what would happen to them if they bucked the Pentagon and the CIA on
Guantanamo. All that the Pentagon would have to do is announce a closure of
major military bases or other facilities in that Congressman’s district.
Immediately, the press would denounce him as an “ineffective congressman,” one
who was incapable of bringing home the political bacon to his district.
What about the Supreme Court? Early on, they rejected
the Pentagon’s arguments that they had no jurisdiction over Guantanamo. The
Court held it did and said that the federal courts would entertain habeas
corpus cases brought by Gitmo prisoners. The Pentagon acceded to the ruling but
it was all part of the façade.
After all, given that there is no constitutional
authorization for the federal government to have a bifurcated judicial system —
one run by the federal courts and the other run by the military — the Court
should have ordered an immediate closure of the facility and a termination of
the kangaroo judicial system that the Pentagon and the CIA established.
Instead, unwilling to cross any red lines when it came
to the national-security branch of the government, the Supreme Court has left
Gitmo standing. That’s why dozens of prisoners have been held there for more
than 10 years without trial and without the hope of a trial, much less a fair
one.
Look at the people who surround President Trump: U.S.
“Defense” Secretary: A general. National Security Council advisor: A general.
Trump’s chief of staff: a general.
Think about those flyovers and all other glorification
of the military and U.S. sporting events and in U.S. airports and churches and
most everywhere else. Think about how so many Americans profusely thank the
troops for protecting our rights and freedoms by killing people abroad who
aren’t threatening our rights and freedoms. Think about how Trump wants to have
“patriotic” military parades, which would undoubtedly feature the latest
missiles, rifles, tanks, and planes.
Remember President Trump before the election? He was
criticizing the Pentagon’s forever wars in Afghanistan and the Middle East. He
was criticizing NATO and the UN. He was fighting a political war against the
CIA. He was all for making friends with Russia.
Today? Trump is expanding the Pentagon’s forever wars.
He let the CIA continue its decades-long secrets in the JFK assassination. He’s
extolling NATO. And he’s imposing sanctions on Russia. Trump has been absorbed
into the national-security establishment blob.
Consider Egypt or, for that matter, Chile under
Pinochet. In Egypt, the military-intelligence establishment runs the
government. Same for Chile under Pinochet. America’s system is not much
different, at least not in principle. The only difference is that in Egypt, the
military-intelligence role is overt, just like it was in Chile. Here in the
United States, the role is more disguised, with the legislative, executive, and
judicial branches being permitted to have a fig leaf of ostensible control.
Welcome to America, one of the world’s premier
military nations.
This
post was written by:Jacob G.
Hornberger
Jacob
G. Hornberger is founder and president of The Future of Freedom Foundation. He
was born and raised in Laredo, Texas, and received his B.A. in economics from
Virginia Military Institute and his law degree from the University of Texas. He
was a trial attorney for twelve years in Texas. He also was an adjunct
professor at the University of Dallas, where he taught law and economics. In
1987, Mr. Hornberger left the practice of law to become director of programs at
the Foundation for Economic Education. He has advanced freedom and free markets
on talk-radio stations all across the country as well as on Fox News’ Neil
Cavuto and Greta van Susteren shows and he appeared as a regular commentator on
Judge Andrew Napolitano’s show Freedom Watch. View these interviews
at LewRockwell.com and from Full Context. Send him email.