Several ideas are offered regarding the reasons/rationalization for such apparently non-patriotic transactions. Reading about the transactions reminded me of the essay written by General Smedley Butler, describing the business aspects of World War I:My favorite section details how the British responded when it turned out they had a drastic shortage of binoculars, which at that time were very important for fighting the war. They turned to the world’s leading manufacturer of “precision optics,” namely Germany. The German War Office immediately supplied 8,000 to 10,000 binoculars to Britain, directly intended and designed for military use. Further orders consisted of many thousands more and the Germans told the British to examine the equipment they had been capturing, to figure out which orders they wished to place.
The Germans in turn demanded rubber from the British, which was needed for their war effort. It was delivered to Germany at the Swiss border.
It has been estimated by statisticians and economists and researchers that the war cost your Uncle Sam $52,000,000,000. Of this sum, $39,000,000,000 was expended in the actual war itself. This expenditure yielded $16,000,000,000 in profits. That is how the 21,000 billionaires and millionaires got that way. This $16,000,000,000 profits is not to be sneezed at. It is quite a tidy sum. And it went to a very few...The essay is called "War is a Racket." The fulltext is available at Mystagogy; it's worth a read.
Marginal Revolution citation via Neatorama.
I'm reminded that prior generations of the Bush family had favorable dealings with Hitler's Germany and learned recently that the grandfather of the Koch brothers, so much in the news of late, worked with Stalin.
ReplyDeleteMaybe one days we'll see wars as between economic groups/corporate interests rather than between nations. I think history's portrayal of WWI makes clear that the common soldier had more common with his opposite number across the trenches than his own officers.
I completely agree with A Progressive Crank. Thanks for sharing this, and especially the links. Well worth a read, and a reminder that the only real winners in any war are those who stand to make the most profit.
ReplyDelete@a progressive crank
ReplyDeleteReferences please re: the Bush family. I'd like to know more about this.
"Maybe one days we'll see wars as between economic groups/corporate interests rather than between nations."
ReplyDeleteLooking at the majority of ongoing civil (intra-state) conflicts around the world, the majority of these are fuelled largely by an economic component: 'lootable' or exhaustible resources are one of the prime factors that lead to ongoing violent conflict. Take the mineral resource 'coltan' (an essential mineral that is found in all mobile phones), largely only available in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, which has been ravaged by one of the most horrific, devastating and lethal wars in the 21st century.
Overall, it's arguably less expensive for companies whose profits are dependent on non-renewable resources (coltan, diamonds, etc.) to exploit a war-torn country than to engage in business with legitimate or stable regime. So while companies might not directly be engaging in violent conflict with one another, they're certainly fuelling it.
@anon - a progressive crank may know of some primary source material for you, but in the meantime you could start with this Guardian article I found with a Google search -
ReplyDeletehttp://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2004/sep/25/usa.secondworldwar
(I don't know if it's been rebutted or whatever).
I imagine the families who sacrificed their metals and rubber for the war efforts, children collecting scrap and such and living without while their sacrifices were gathered and handed over to factories that sold it all to Uncle Sam for record profits.
ReplyDeleteWill we ever learn?
Happens in hot wars and cold wars alike, let's not forget the guns and dope of Iran-Contra, the continuing oil shenanigans of Halliburton-Iran, and what Israel did to a certain US destroyer...
ReplyDeletehttp://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A58298-2005Feb2.html
http://www.counterpunch.org/2003/10/24/israel-s-attack-on-the-liberty-revisited/