{"id":373250,"date":"2018-08-13T22:53:46","date_gmt":"2018-08-13T21:53:46","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/?p=373250"},"modified":"2018-08-13T22:53:46","modified_gmt":"2018-08-13T21:53:46","slug":"americas-militarized-economy","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/editorials\/americas-militarized-economy\/","title":{"rendered":"America’s Militarized Economy"},"content":{"rendered":"

Eric Zuesse, originally posted at Unz Review<\/span><\/a><\/span><\/p>\n

Donald Trump\u2019s biggest success, thus far into his Presidency, has been his sale of $400 billion (originally $350 billion)<\/span><\/a> of U.S.-made weapons to the Saudi Arabian Government, which is owned by its royal family, after whom that nation is named. This sale alone is big enough to be called Trump\u2019s \u201cjobs plan\u201d for Americans. It is also the biggest weapons-sale in all of history. It\u2019s 400 billion dollars, not 400 million dollars; it is gigantic, and, by far, unprecedented in world-history.<\/span><\/p>\n

The weapons that the Sauds and their friends, the 7 monarchies that constitute the United Arab Emirates, are using right now, in order to conquer and subdue Yemen, are almost entirely made in America. That\u2019s terrific business for America. Not only are Americans employed, in strategically important congressional districts (that is, politically important congressional districts), to manufacture this equipment for mass-murdering in foreign lands that never threatened (much less invaded) America, but the countries that purchase this equipment are thereby made dependent upon the services of those American manufacturers, and of the taxpayer-funded U.S. \u2018Defense\u2019 Department and its private military contractors such as Lockheed Martin, to maintain this equipment, and to train the local military enforcers, on how to operate these weapons. Consequently, foreign customers of U.S. military firms are buying not only U.S. weapons, but the U.S. Government’s protection \u2014 the protection by the U.S. military, of those monarchs. They are buying the label of being an \u201cAmerican ally\u201d so that the U.S. news media can say that this is in defense of American allies (regardless of whether it\u2019s even that). American weapons are way overpriced for what they can do, but they are a bargain for what they can extract out of America\u2019s taxpayers, who fund the U.S. \u2018Defense\u2019 Department and thus fund the protection of those monarchs: these kings and other dictators get U.S. taxpayers to fund their protection. It\u2019s an international protection-racket funded by American taxpayers and those rulers, in order to protect those rulers; and the victims aren\u2019t only the people who get slaughtered in countries such as Afghanistan, and Iraq, and Libya, and Syria, and Yemen, and Palestine, but also (though only financially) are the American public, who get fleeced by it \u2014 the American public provide the bulk of the real funding for this operation to expand the lands where America\u2019s allies rule, and so to serve both America\u2019s aristocracy and the aristocracies that are America\u2019s allies.<\/span><\/p>\n

This is how today\u2019s America enforces its \u2018democracy’ around the world, so that America can spread this \u2018democracy\u2019, at gunpoint, and at bomb-point, like America\u2019s allies, those Kings and Emirs, and the apartheid regime in Israel, are doing, to the people whom they kill and conquer, with help from the taxpayer-funded American military \u2014 funded to protect those aristocrats, against their respective publics, and to further enrich America\u2019s own aristocrats, at the expense of America\u2019s own public.<\/span><\/p>\n

The global \u2018aggressor\u2019 has been identified by America\u2019s previous President, Barack Obama<\/a><\/span>, who won office like Trump did, by promising \u2018a reset\u2019 in relations with post-communist Russia, and by mocking Obama’s opponent<\/span><\/a> (Mitt Romney) for having called Russia \u201cthe number one geopolitical foe\u201d<\/span><\/a> \u2014 which America\u2019s aristocracy has historically considered Russia to be, ever since the aristocracy in Russia fled and were killed in 1917, which caused America\u2019s and other aristocracies to fear and hate Russia and Russians, for having ousted its aristocracy, this being an act that aristocrats everywhere are determined to avenge, regardless of \u2018ideology\u2019<\/span><\/a>. (Similarly, America and its pro-aristocracy foreign allies, seek to avenge Iran\u2019s 1979 overthrow of the Shah.) As Obama\u2019s own actions during his subsequent Presidency made clear, and as he already had started in 2011 (if not from day one of his Presidency) secretly to implement, he privately agreed with what Romney said on that occasion, but he was intelligent enough (which his opponent obviously was not) to recognize that the American public, at that time, did not agree with it but instead believed that Islamic terrorists and aristocrats such as the Sauds who finance them are that); and Obama took full advantage of his opponent\u2019s blunder there, which helped Obama to win a second term in the White House (after having skillfully hidden from the public during his first term, his intention to weaken Russia by eliminating leaders who were friends or even allies of Russia, such as in Syria, and Ukraine). <\/span><\/p>\n

This is American \u2018democracy\u2019, after all (rule by deceit, lies<\/span><\/a>), and that\u2019s the reason why, when Russia, in 2014, responded to the U.S. coup in Ukraine (a coup under the cover of anti-corruption demonstrations) which coup was taking over this large country next-door to Russia and thus constituted a deadly threat to Russia\u2019s national security, Obama declared Russia to be the world\u2019s top \u2018aggressor\u2019<\/span><\/a>. Obama overthrew Ukraine and then damned Russia\u2019s leader Putin for responding to Obama\u2019s aggressive threat against Russia from this coup in neighboring Ukraine. Russia was supposedly the \u2018aggressor\u2019 because it allowed the residents of Crimea \u2014 which had been part of Russia until the Soviet dictator in 1954 had arbitrarily handed Crimea to Ukraine \u2014 to become Russian citizens again, Russians like 90% of them felt they still were, despite Khrushchev\u2019s transfer of them to Ukraine in 1954. The vast majority of Crimeans felt themselves still to be<\/i> Russians. But Obama and allies of the U.S. Government insisted that the newly installed Government of Ukraine must rule those people; those people must not be permitted to rule (or be ruled) by people they\u2019ve participated in choosing.<\/span><\/p>\n

Ever since at least 2011, the U.S. Government was planning to overthrow Ukraine\u2019s democratically elected Government; and the plan started being put into action by no later than 1 March 2013 inside America\u2019s Ukrainian Embassy.<\/a><\/span> In preparation for this planned coup (\u201cthe most blatant coup in history\u201d<\/span><\/a>), a poll of Crimeans was funded by the International Republican Institute and USAID, in which Gallup scientifically sampled Crimeans during 16-30 May 2013, six months prior to the forced rejection on 20 November 2013 of EU membership by Ukraine\u2019s democratically elected government<\/span><\/a> \u2014 that\u2019s six months prior to the Ukrainian Government\u2019s rejection that Obama\u2019s team were intending to use as being the pretext for the anti-Government demonstrations, which would start on Kiev\u2019s Maidan Square the day after this forced rejection, on November 21st. The poll of Crimeans<\/span><\/a> (which was made public on 7 October 2013<\/span><\/a>) found (here are highlights):<\/span><\/p>\n

\u2014<\/span><\/p>\n

p.14:<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cIf Ukraine was able to enter only one international economic union, which entity should it be with?\u201d<\/i><\/span><\/p>\n

53% \u201cCustoms Union with Russia, Belarus and Kazakhstan\u201d<\/i><\/span><\/p>\n

17% \u201cThe European Union\u201d<\/i><\/span><\/p>\n

p.15:<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cHow would you evaluate your attitude to the following entities?\u201d<\/i><\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cRussia\u201d:<\/i>\u00a0 <\/span>68% \u201cWarm\u201d;<\/i>\u00a0 <\/span>5% \u201cCold\u201d<\/i><\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cUSA\u201d:<\/i>\u00a0 <\/span>6% \u201cWarm\u201d;<\/i>\u00a0 <\/span>24% \u201cCold\u201d<\/i> <\/span><\/p>\n

p.17:<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cIn your opinion, what should the status of Crimea be?\u201d<\/i><\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cAutonomy in Ukraine (as today <\/i>[under Crimea\u2019s 1992 Constitution<\/span><\/a> and as subsequently celebrated by RFE\/RL on 20 January 2011<\/span><\/a>] )\u201d:<\/i>\u00a0 <\/span>53%.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cCommon oblast of Ukraine<\/i> [ruled under Ukraine\u2019s 1991 Constitution]\u201d:<\/i>\u00a0 <\/span>2%.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cCrimea should be separated and given to Russia\u201d:<\/i>\u00a0 <\/span>23%.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u2014<\/span><\/p>\n

In other words: prior to the U.S. State Department and CIA operation to steal Ukraine\u2019s government from Ukraine\u2019s citizens \u2014 including especially<\/i> from the residents of the sole autonomously governed region in Ukraine, which was Crimea \u2014 53% of Crimeans wanted continued autonomy, 23% wanted not only a total break away from the Ukrainian Government but their becoming again citizens of Russia, such as had existed until 1954; and only 2% wanted restoration of the situation in 1991 when Crimea was briefly a \u201ccommon oblast\u201d or regular region within Ukraine, a federal state within Ukraine just like all the other states within Ukraine were. And, obviously, after America\u2019s coup in Ukraine, the percentage who wanted a total break away from Ukraine rose even higher than it had been before.<\/span><\/p>\n

Consequently, the U.S. demand that the newly imposed Ukrainian regime, which Obama\u2019s coup created, made upon Crimea subsequent to the coup, and which demand both Obama and his successor Trump insist must be imposed upon and obeyed by Crimeans if the anti-Russia sanctions are even possibly to end, is the demand that Crimeans, in that May 2013 poll, even prior to the bloody Obama coup<\/span><\/a> and the takeover of Ukraine by rabidly anti-Crimean Ukrainian nazis<\/span><\/a>, had supported by only 2%<\/b> (it was demanding reimposition of the brief 1991 Ukrainian relationship, which Crimeans had rejected in 1991), as compared to the 53% of Crimeans who favored continuation of Crimean \u201cautonomy,\u201d and the 23% who favored becoming Russians again.<\/span><\/p>\n

Furthermore, the May 2013 poll showed that only 17% of Crimeans favored becoming part of the EU, whereas 53% preferred to be part of the \u201cCustoms Union with Russia, Belarus and Kazakhstan\u201d; so, clearly, Crimeans, prior to the democratically elected Ukrainian Government\u2019s having declined the EU\u2019s offer, overwhelmingly wanted Ukraine\u2019s democratically elected Government to do precisely what it did \u2014 to turn down the EU\u2019s offer.<\/span><\/p>\n

During the U.S. coup<\/span><\/a>, and immediately after it, until the 16 March 2014 Crimean referendum on what to do about it, Crimeans saw and heard on television and via the other Ukrainian media, reports<\/span><\/a> that could only have terrified them about the new Government\u2019s intentions. Clearly the U.S. regime had no objection to placing nazis<\/span><\/a> in charge, and Crimeans are intensely anti-nazi \u2014 not only anti-Nazi during Hitler\u2019s time, but against nazism, the racist-fascist ideology, itself, regardless of which group it\u2019s targeting; but, in their case, it targets Crimeans, and, more broadly, Russians<\/i>. <\/span><\/p>\n

A January 2015 poll of Crimeans was financed by the U.S.-allied Canadian Government, and never made public by them but released in early February only on an obscure site of the polling organization and never reported to the public in the Western press, and this poll found<\/span><\/a> (probably to the sponsors\u2019 enormous disappointment) that 93% of respondents did \u201cendorse Russia\u2019s annexation of Crimea\u201d<\/span><\/a> and 4% did not. On 16 March 2015, the U.S. State Department issued a statement<\/span><\/a>: \u201cOn this one year anniversary of the sham \u2018referendum\u2019 in\u00a0Crimea, held in clear violation of Ukrainian law and the\u00a0Ukrainian constitution, the United States reiterates its\u00a0condemnation of a vote that was not voluntary,\u00a0transparent, or democratic.\u201d No evidence was provided for any of that assertion, simply the allegation. Four days later, the far more honest Kenneth Rapoza at Forbes<\/i> headlined \u201cOne Year After Russia Annexed Crimea,\u201d<\/span><\/a> and he opened:<\/span><\/p>\n

The U.S and European Union may want to save Crimeans from themselves. But the Crimeans are happy right where they are. One year after the annexation of the Ukrainian peninsula in the Black Sea, poll after poll shows that the locals there \u2014 be they Ukrainians, ethnic Russians or Tatars are mostly all in agreement: life with Russia is better than life with Ukraine.<\/i><\/span><\/p>\n

Little has changed over the last 12 months. Despite huge efforts on the part of Kiev, Brussels, Washington and the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe, the bulk of humanity living on the Black Sea peninsula believe the referendum to secede from Ukraine was legit.\u00a0 <\/span>At some point, the West will have to recognize Crimea\u2019s right to self rule.<\/i><\/span><\/p>\n

The U.S. and its allies have a different idea than that. They reject Rapoza\u2019s view.<\/span><\/p>\n

The United States claims to support \u2018democracy\u2019. But it demands imposition upon Crimeans of a rabidly anti-Crimean Government<\/span><\/a>. What kind of \u2018democracy\u2019 does the United States actually support? Has the U.S. Government answered that question in Crimea \u2014 and, in Ukraine \u2014 by its actions<\/i> there? Obama supported this kind<\/span><\/a> of \u2018democracy\u2019, and this kind<\/span><\/a>. He wanted this kind<\/span><\/a> of treatment of Crimeans. Trump hasn\u2019t yet made clear whether he does, too; but his official representatives have made clear that they do. <\/span><\/p>\n

America has a militarized economy<\/span><\/a>. It also currently has the very highest percentage of its people in prison out of all of the world\u2019s 222 countries<\/span><\/a> and so certainly qualifies as a police state (which Americans who are lucky enough to be not amongst the lower socio-economic classes might find to be a shocking thing to assert). On top of that, everyone knows that America\u2019s military spending is by far the highest in the world, but many don\u2019t know that it\u2019s the most corrupt and so the U.S. actually spends around half of the entire world\u2019s military budget and that the U.S. \u2018Defense\u2019 Department is even so corrupt that it has been unauditable and thus unaudited for decades, and that many U.S. military programs are counted in other federal departments in order to hide from the public how much<\/span><\/a> is actually being spent each year on the military, which is well over a trillion dollars annually, probably more than half of all federal discretionary (which excludes interest on the debt, some of which pays for prior wars) spending. So, it\u2019s a very militarized economy, indeed<\/i>.<\/span><\/p>\n

This is today\u2019s American \u2018democracy\u2019<\/span><\/a>. Is it also \u2018democracy\u2019 in America\u2019s allied countries? (Obviously, they are more democratic than America regarding just the incarceration-rate; but what about generally?) Almost all of those countries continue to say that America is a democracy (despite the proof<\/span><\/a> that it is not), and that they are likewise. Are they correct in both? Are they allied with a \u2018democracy\u2019 against democracy? Or, are they, in fact, phonies as democracies? These are serious questions, and bumper-sticker answers to them won\u2019t suffice anymore \u2014 not after invading Iraq in 2003, and Libya in 2011, and Syria right afterward, and Ukraine in 2014, and Yemen today, etc.<\/span><\/p>\n

Please send this article along to friends, and ask for their thoughts about this. Because, in any actual democracy, everyone should be discussing these issues, under the prevailing circumstances. Taxpayer-funded mass-slaughter is now routine and goes on year after year. After a few decades of this, shouldn\u2019t people start discussing the matter? Why haven\u2019t they been? Isn\u2019t this the time to start? Or is America so much of a dictatorship that it simply won\u2019t happen? We\u2019ll see.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u2014\u2014\u2014\u2014\u2014<\/span><\/p>\n

Investigative historian Eric Zuesse is the author, most recently, of\u00a0 They\u2019re Not Even Close: The Democratic vs. Republican Economic Records, 1910-2010<\/i><\/span><\/a>,<\/i> and of<\/span> \u00a0<\/i>CHRIST\u2019S VENTRILOQUISTS: The Event that Created Christianity<\/i><\/span><\/a><\/span>.<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Eric Zuesse, originally posted at Unz Review Donald Trump\u2019s biggest success, thus far into his Presidency, has been his sale of $400 billion (originally $350 billion) of U.S.-made weapons to the Saudi Arabian Government, which is owned by its royal family, after whom that nation is named. This sale alone is big enough to be […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1254,"featured_media":373252,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[461,519],"tags":[115,30,3604,59,524,754,523,49,76,1024],"class_list":{"0":"post-373250","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-editorials","8":"category-newswire","9":"tag-barack-obama","10":"tag-big-brother","11":"tag-donald-trump","12":"tag-military","13":"tag-russia","14":"tag-syria","15":"tag-ukraine","16":"tag-usa-news","17":"tag-warfare","18":"tag-ww3"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/373250","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1254"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=373250"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/373250\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":373253,"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/373250\/revisions\/373253"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/373252"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=373250"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=373250"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=373250"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}