{"id":363262,"date":"2018-05-29T20:37:43","date_gmt":"2018-05-29T19:37:43","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/newswire\/1918-consortiumnews\/"},"modified":"2018-05-29T20:37:43","modified_gmt":"2018-05-29T19:37:43","slug":"1918-consortiumnews","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/newswire\/1918-consortiumnews\/","title":{"rendered":"1918 \u2013 Consortiumnews"},"content":{"rendered":"
\n

On Memorial Day 2018, in the year marking the 100<\/span>th\u00a0<\/sup><\/span>anniversary of the end of World War I, Michael Parenti contemplates the trenches and the oligarchs who caused so much unnecessary misery.<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

By Michael Parenti \u00a0<\/b><\/span>Special to Consortium News <\/i><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\"\"

No, Gatti,\u00a0<\/span><\/span>caro mio<\/i><\/span><\/span>, those few men are not dreamers; they are\u00a0<\/span><\/span>schemers<\/i><\/span><\/span>. They perch above us. See how their armament contracts are turned into private fortunes\u2014while the young men are turned into dust: more blood, more money; good for business this war.<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

It is the rich old men,\u00a0<\/span><\/span>i pauci<\/i><\/span><\/span>, \u201cthe few,\u201d as Cicero called the Senate oligarchs whom he faithfully served in ancient Rome. It is the few, who together constitute a bloc of industrialists and landlords, who think war will bring bigger markets abroad and civic discipline at home. One of\u00a0<\/span><\/span>i pauci<\/i><\/span><\/span>\u00a0in 1914 saw war as a way of promoting compliance and obedience on the labor front and\u2014as he himself said\u2014war, \u201cwould permit the hierarchal reorganization of class relations.\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

Just awhile before the heresies of Karl Marx were spreading among Europe\u2019s lower ranks. The proletariats of each country, growing in numbers and strength, were made to wage war against each other. What better way to confine and misdirect them than with the swirl of mutual destruction.<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

Then there were the generals and other militarists who started plotting this war as early as 1906, eight years before the first shots were fired. War for them means glory, medals, promotions, financial rewards, inside favors, and dining with ministers, bankers, and diplomats: the whole prosperity of death. When the war finally comes, it is greeted with quiet satisfaction by the generals.<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

Moguls and Monarchs Prevail\"\"

But the young men are ripped by waves of machine-gun fire or blown apart by exploding shells. War comes with gas attacks and sniper shots: grenades, mortars, and artillery barrages; the roar of a great inferno and the sickening…<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

Read more<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

On Memorial Day 2018, in the year marking the 100th\u00a0anniversary of the end of World War I, Michael Parenti contemplates the trenches and the oligarchs who caused so much unnecessary misery. By Michael Parenti \u00a0Special to Consortium News Looking back at the years of fury and carnage, Colonel Angelo Gatti, staff officer of the Italian […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2524,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[519],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-363262","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-newswire"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/363262","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2524"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=363262"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/363262\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=363262"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=363262"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=363262"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}