USA – The American Way of War
Eugene Jarecki on The American Way of War: Guided Missiles, Misguided Men, and a Republic in Peril
The American way of war is usually a term used to think about sort of what America brought to war making that other countries hadnt done before, typically sort of mass production of equipment and weapons and logistics. And I sort of saw something evolve over our history that I thought was better represented by that term, the American way of war, which is really how America lost her way through war making, what war has done, the best of wars, the worst of wars, wars that seemed, quote, necessary and wars that seemed frivolous or sort of shadowy motives, like the one weve just experienced. The wars of all kinds, they guide America away from her founding principles, from basic standard norms of decency and humanity. And I think the American way of war is a sort of—is a very tragic way, in a sense, that needs now to be fixed, needs to be rescued. And thats where I think the public comes in so necessarily.
Perfect example. You know, the B-1 bomber has a piece of it made, a piece of the plane made, in every single US state. Now, why? I mean, thats not an efficient way to make a product. So, it must be serving some end. And the end, it turns out, that it serves is that the B-1 bomber was designed by its makers according to a process called political engineering, fancy word for distributing the contracts and subcontracts to build a given weapons system to as many states, as many congressional districts as possible, not lets make it as efficient as possible, but rather, lets put it in as many districts as possible, so that if this thing ever comes up for review, everybodys getting a piece of the action, everybodys in on it. And as a result, when, you know, the questions arise—Do we need the B-1 bomber? Do we need to be spending this money?—there is a constituency built in in Congress thats going to keep that thing going.
And what does that tell us? That tells us that—first of all, the defense sector is not alone in that. Every industry has their version of politically engineering Congress. But what it does is it puts the congressperson in a position of being a professional pleader to that corporation, that corporate interest, on behalf of them to the federal government. And it suborns, it really undermines the purity of their decision making. It produces some of the very tragic and wrong-headed decisions that weve seen in recent years.
Documentary: Why We Fight
The American Way of War – New Book By Eugene Jarecki
THE AMERICAN WAY OF WAR: Guided Missiles, Misguided Men, and a Republic in Peril. A new book by Eugene Jarecki.
‘Why We Fight’ Director on the American Way of War
Filmmaker Eugene Jarecki speaks with Truthdig’s Kasia Anderson about his new book, whether Obama can deliver, and why the U.S. is like Elvis.
As a European I am convinced that EU is a good experiment. It has prevented war, it is democratic and it is based on cooperation. Later there will probably be an united America, an united Asia and an united Africa. Maqby an united Middle Eat. And in a few hundred years a world-government.