The "War on Terror" is merely a substitute for the Cold War.

[bobweaver]

The ruling class in the United States correctly perceived the spread of Communism as a threat to their entrenched power structure in the U.S. They saw the ruling classes of Russia and then China, two very large nations, toppled by Communism and figured if they didn't fight it, they would be next. This was the real motivation behind the Korean and Vietnam conflicts - the U.S. ruling class trying to protect themselves and their power by stamping out the spread of Communism wherever it might pop up in the world.

At the same time, a faction of the ruling class (the Military-Industrial complex) discovered there was money to be made by the cold war - big money, in fact. Most of the big defense contractors made huge profits in the Cold War - how many missiles did General Dynamics build and how much profit did they make - and how many missiles were ever actually used? Lockheed, Martin Marietta, Rohr, Boeing, Teledyne, Raytheon, Northrop, Litton, General Electric, Pratt & Whitney, SAIC, GTE, TRW, Motorola, Halliburton, and on and on. (Many of these corporations have now merged.) These corporations made huge profits from the Cold War. When the Cold War ended, the ruling class of the U.S. breathed a huge sigh of relief - "ahhh.... we won... capitalism is safe at last... break out the champagne."

But not long after, the end of the Cold War resulted in military downsizing, and reductions in pentagon budgets, and less money for the defense contractor industry. The faction of the ruling class which profited from the Cold War military buildup soon realized that when those kids were tearing down the Berlin Wall, they were also tearing down at the defense contractor's profits - putting them dangerously close to going out of business. (Quite a few people I knew here in San Diego who had worked for General Dynamics for years were either forced to relocate or else just change to other careers.) What to do about this? Well, naturally, we need a new enemy -> new wars -> new military spending -> new profits!

Terrorist attacks such as the 1993 bombing of the World Trade Center and the 1995 bombing of the federal building in Oklahoma City gave them their answer: the War on Terror! It's the new Cold War. It's a direct threat to our way of life in America! (Let's not muddy up the argument with the fact that the odds of the average American being attacked by a terrorist while on U.S. soil are miniscule). The whole "War on Terror" is a giant profit-making industry for the defense contractors, that has been packaged and sold to the American public. It does not represent nearly the threat to the U.S. ruling class that Communism represented, but there sure is a lot of profit to be made in it.

This is one reason why there is no particular effort to get the U.S. out of Iraq or get that situation resolved. And even when Iraq is finally resolved, the "War on Terror" just moves onto another front. It's a huge money-making machine for the Republicans and their donors in the defense contract industry, and has replaced the Cold War as the "justification" for it. Probably everyone on Democratic Underground who read this knows all this stuff anyway, but I'm looking to strengthen this piece for posting on some other sites including the right-leaning ones.

[Sanity Claws]

1. I agree

Remember we were supposed to get a peace dividend when the Cold War ended? Instead, the military industrial complex came up with new reasons why to spend our money. They already had the Iraq invasion planned way before 9/11.

[justa]

5. Remember where the term "peace dividend" came from

Shrubs father and his defense secretary Chaney.

[Merlot]

2. Don't forget the "War on Drugs"

and the "War on Poverty"

[HysteryDiagnosis]

3. Another winner. They must squirm a bit when they see so many seeing

through their little rouse. Shame.

[cruadin]

4. I agree, but good luck posting this kind of perspective...

on a "right-leaning" site.
You'll come too close to upsetting the apple cart.

[hollowdweller]

6. Take any speech from a hawk in the Vietnam era , scratch out communisim

pencil in "Terrorisim" and it's the same stuff as now.

[Massacure]

7. You can't have a war on terrorism. Terrorism is an inanimate object.

Besides, the country can't continue to spend like it does. Borrowed money = higher interest rates. Higher interest rates = slower economy. Slower economy = less tax revenue. Less taxes = less military.

[dems4israel]

8. I guess the author missed something that occured in 2001

Al-Quida actually attacked our mainland the Soviets never did that
nor do I think they would have even though they hated us as well
but I think Al-Quida actually believes it can replace the US with a Islamic style nation in the style of Taliban Afganistan its not rational to think Al-Quida and other like minded Terrorist Organizations are not a real threat to the security of the US

[midnight armadillo]

11. They're not as big a threat as the USSR

Al-Qaeda has demonstrated the ability to kill thousands of US citizens. With a different selection of targets (i.e. nuke power plants or chemical plants) they could have killed tens of thousands.

The USSR has the demonstrated ability to wipe every major city in the US off the map several times over via ICBMs, plus they had the largest (or one of the largest) militaries in the world in their heyday. A military that was lined up on the borders of US allies.

Really, comparing the threat of Al Qaeda the safety and continued existence of the US with that posed by the mutual Cold War US/USSR belligerence is laughable. Al Qaeda's goals, as specified by OBL, were clear: US out of Saudi Arabia (done!), along with a few others that I can't remember at the moment. None of them involved replacing the US government with an Islamic theocracy.

Oh, and not intended to offend, the liberal use of proper capitalization and punctuation really helps your posts' readability. Just a thought.

[mulethree]

12. But it's not just Al' Qaeda

It's all terrorists - or at least the ones who threaten us and our allies.

So anyone who rebels against global autocracy, any egalitarian who gets militant, any 'rogue' nation whether seeking to protect itself, maintain control over it's own resources or just demanding anything like egalitarian justice.

Whats the difference between terrorism and U.S. revolutionary minutemen who used guerrilla warfare against the British and were 'rogue' for refusing to form neat ranks on a traditional battlefield? Same thing - as a tactic.

We don't fight anyone unless we severely outgun them. So anyone we fight with our 'asymmetrical warfare' or 'overwhelming force' will have to resort to guerrilla tactics thus becoming terrorists at some point along the fight.

So whats in a word? Isn't the 'terror' of MAD just as bad domestically? Keep the population in fear! It was there in the 50's and 60's and 80's and lapsed only in the 70's (mideast war, oil scare, float the dollar, accept defeat in Vietnam, huge inflation) and the 90's (oil scare, mideast war, power struggles in east europe, free trade alliance). We seem to need some far-away, unseen enemy to hype up whenever we don't have quite enough intrinisic scare to do the job.

So now they're getting desperate? we've got mideast war, oil scare, east europe - central asia - east asia - and a bit of african and latin american power struggles, huge financial problems and they need to add vague external threats on top of it?

So the U.S. people are shaking in their boots, but lets terrorize the rest of the world as well. We'll put a moron in charge and surround him with war-mongers. Then we'll eliminate our ability to respond to crisis with any sort of humanity - by tying up our military in Iraq so our only recourses are extremelly brutal warmaking whether conventional or otherwise, and lets eliminate our economic and diplomatic influence at the same time. Now, if you piss us off, we will have no choice but to bomb the bejesus out of you - and watch out! we're so scared that it won't take much to piss us off.

[Darranar]

9. Indeed. Threats, real or imagined, are a useful excuse for...

profit-making.

[leesa]

10. Certainly is. The war on "terrorism" is just as bogus as the war against

communism and the war on drugs. ALL are designed to give us an excuse to overthrow governments, steal resources and get rich selling war toys.

[trezic]

13. An observation

This argument is a new take on an old theme : greedy arms manufacturers and international bankers create wars to make money. It was first seen in the Protocols of the Elders of Zion, but has been seen since from the Nye Committee, CPUSA, the Committee of Concerned Asia Scholars, and those surrounding the America First movement.

Subduing al-Qaeda is a laudable goal. This group acts like a band of rabid dogs. One can negotiate with people who are at least quasi-rational, but not with zealots.

As for the 'ruling class' and the Cold War...
1920s USSR: 2-3 million dead of famine while the USSR was a net grain exporter

1930s Ukraine: 8(?) million dead of famine to 'punish' the kulaks, while, once again, the USSR was a net grain exporter

1935-38 USSR: the Great Terror, estimates of 3-5 million dead

1945-6 Vietnam: while Ho Chi Minh is in Paris for treaty talks, General Giap is busy murdering 10,000 non-Stalinist nationalists

1958-61 China: 30 million dead of famine in the Great Leap Backward

1965-76 China: the virtual destruction of Chinese society and at least hundreds of thousands killed in the Cultural Revolution

1970s Cambodia: 1-2 million dead thanks to the Khmer Rouge

1989 China: over 3000 dead at Tiananmen Square

1980s Ethopia: in order to subdue the Etrian rebels, Mengistu decides on a policy of deliberate famine; when the West attempts to aid, the grain is given to the army and the starving continue to die

Perhaps the initial opposition, in 1917 or so, to communism could be blamed on the elites. However, it became clear in a hurry exactly what a Soviet-dominated world could expect from such a system.

[Name removed]

14. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[Sparkly]

16. Huh? When did Kerry say "ignore Iran and North Korea?"

:eyes:

Nukes are the greatest threat in terms of magnitude, but an awful lot can be influenced by other forms of attack, as I think we've all experienced now. The operations of government can change. We are woefully unprepared for a nuke in our ports, but we are also unprepared for a biological attack or for an attack on one of our own chem/nuke facilities, for example.

You can thank King George.

[Sparkly]

15. In fact, I think they were going without that phrase at first

but with the same idea. When they took office, they ignored terrorism. Ignored it. I remember all the rhetoric when they took office sounding exactly like it had as the same clowns left off before Clinton took office -- it was like a direct return to the 80's. "ICBM's from ROGUE NATIONS!!!" Remember? That was their mantra. It was clear they had an invasion planned for the middle east, and Iraq was the likely target.

I remember "yelling" at people on moron message boards (AOL if you can imagine) saying "That's not the threat anymore! Threats that can be carried in a suitcase are now greater than 'ICBMs from rogue nations.'"

"Stop inventing terrorist bogeymen, you Scarocrat!" They'd insist. "If anybody did that we'd wipe them out."

"But 'they' aren't in any one place, they're loosely organized networks around the world."

"Oh sure, who told you that, Clintoon? Where are the black helicopters now? Terrorists! Terrorists! Boo!"

If I told them about what had been happening, they said Clinton was wagging the dog, they said he's misused the FBI and CIA, but if he used the military they said he'd misused that, blah blah blah. They would NEVER admit even the existence of terrorism as a threat, because that was not what the White House was spouting. It wasn't the blast-faxed message; it wasn't what Rush or anybody else was scripted to say. The message was: "ICBMs from rogue nations."

In August 2001 hearing Daschle (yes Daschle) give a speech urging the Republicans to use defense spending better, including against terrorism, to guard ports and borders, etc. etc... I remember linking that speech over and over again, and none of them would listen.

The administration was geared up to go back to mega defense budgets for Star Wars missile defense and to invade Iraq from the START. I have no doubt about that at all. The attacks of 9/11 were only their excuse, their greatest boost. They switched gears only slightly, including this new name "War on Terror." And they got a public that was instantly compliant.

It still pisses me off just thinking about it.