| Chapter Four of Pax Americana: The Military Industrial Complex and the War On Terror by Danny Quintana |
| The Military-Industrial Complex The farewell address of President Dwight D. Eisenhower, 1961 |
My fellow Americans:
Three days from now, after half a century in the service of our country, I shall lay down the responsibilities of office as, in traditional and
solemn ceremony the authority of the Presidency is vested in my successor. This evening I come to you with a message of leave-taking and
farewell, and to share a few final thoughts with you, my countrymen. Like every other citizen, I wish the new President, and all who will labor
with him, Godspeed. I pray that the coming years will be blessed with peace and prosperity for all. Our people expect their President and the
Congress to find essential agreement on issues of great moment, the wise resolution of which will better shape the future of the Nation.
My own relations with the Congress, which began on a remote and tenuous basis when, long ago, a member of the Senate appointed me to
West Point, have since ranged to the intimate during the war and immediate post-war period, and, finally, to the mutually interdependent
during these past eight years. In this final relationship, the Congress and the Administration have, on most vital issues, cooperated well to
serve the national good rather than mere partisanship, and so have assured that the business of the Nation should go forward. So, my official
relationship with the Congress ends in a feeling, on my part, of gratitude that we have been able to do so much together.
II.
We now stand ten years past the midpoint of a century that has witnessed four major wars among great nations. Three of these involved our
own country. Despite these holocausts America is today the strongest, the most influential and most productive nation in the world.
Understandably proud of this pre-eminence, we yet realize that America's leadership and prestige depend, not merely upon our unmatched
material progress, riches and military strength, but on how we use our power in the interests of world peace and human betterment.
III.
Throughout America's adventure in free government, our basic purposes have been to keep the peace; to foster progress in human
achievement, and to enhance liberty, dignity and integrity among people and among nations. To strive for less would be unworthy of a free
and religious people. Any failure traceable to arrogance, or our lack of comprehension or readiness to sacrifice would inflict upon us
grievous hurt both at home and abroad.
Progress toward these noble goals is persistently threatened by the conflict now engulfing the world. It commands our whole attention,
absorbs our very beings. We face a hostile ideology -- global in scope, atheistic in character, ruthless in purpose, and insidious in method.
Unhappily the danger is poses promises to be of indefinite duration. To meet it successfully, there is called for, not so much the
emotional and transitory sacrifices of crisis, but rather those which enable us to carry forward steadily, surely, and without complaint the
burdens of a prolonged and complex struggle -- with liberty the stake. Only thus shall we remain, despite every provocation, on our charted
course toward permanent peace and human betterment.
Crises there will continue to be. In meeting them, whether foreign or domestic, great or small, there is a recurring temptation to feel that some
spectacular and costly action could become the miraculous solution to all current difficulties. A huge increase in newer elements of our
defense; development of unrealistic programs to cure every ill in agriculture; a dramatic expansion in basic and applied research
-- these and many other possibilities, each possibly promising in itself, may be suggested as the only way to the road we wish to travel.
But each proposal must be weighed in the light of a broader consideration: the need to maintain balance in and among national programs --
balance between the private and the public economy, balance between cost and hoped for advantage -- balance between the clearly
necessary and the comfortably desirable; balance between our essential requirements as a nation and the duties imposed by the nation
upon the individual; balance between actions of the moment and the national welfare of the future. Good judgment seeks balance and
progress; lack of it eventually finds imbalance and frustration. The record of many decades stands as proof that our people and their
government have, in the main, understood these truths and have responded to them well, in the face of stress and threat. But threats,
new in kind or degree, constantly arise. I mention two only.
IV.
A vital element in keeping the peace is our military establishment. Our arms must be mighty, ready for instant action, so that no potential
aggressor may be tempted to risk his own destruction. Our military organization today bears little relation to that known by any of my
predecessors in peacetime, or indeed by the fighting men of World War II or Korea. Until the latest of our world conflicts, the United States
had no armaments industry. American makers of plowshares could, with time and as required, make swords as well. But now we can no longer
risk emergency improvisation of national defense; we have been compelled to create a permanent armaments industry of vast proportions.
Added to this, three and a half million men and women are directly engaged in the defense establishment. We annually spend on military
security more than the net income of all United States corporations.
This conjunction of an immense military establishment and a large arms industry is new in the American experience. The total influence --
economic, political, even spiritual -- is felt in every city, every State house, every office of the Federal government. We recognize the
imperative need for this development. Yet we must not fail to comprehend its grave implications. Our toil, resources and livelihood are all
involved; so is the very structure of our society. In the councils of government, we must guard against the acquisition of unwarranted
influence, whether sought or unsought, by the military-industrial complex. The potential for the disastrous rise of misplaced power exists and
will persist. (emphasis added).We must never let the weight of this combination endanger our liberties or democratic processes. We
should take nothing for granted. Only an alert and knowledgeable citizenry can compel the proper meshing of the huge industrial and military
machinery of defense with our peaceful methods and goals, so that security and liberty may prosper together.
Akin to, and largely responsible for the sweeping changes in our industrial-military posture, has been the technological revolution during
recent decades. In this revolution, research has become central; it also becomes more formalized, complex, and costly. A steadily increasing
share is conducted for, by, or at the direction of, the Federal government.
Today, the solitary inventor, tinkering in his shop, has been overshadowed by task forces of scientists in laboratories and testing fields. In the
same fashion, the free university, historically the fountainhead of free ideas and scientific discovery, has experienced a revolution in the
conduct of research. Partly because of the huge costs involved, a government contract becomes virtually a substitute for intellectual curiosity.
For every old blackboard there are now hundreds of new electronic computers. The prospect of domination of the nation's scholars by
Federal employment, project allocations, and the power of money is ever present and is gravely to be regarded. Yet, in holding scientific
research and discovery in respect, as we should, we must also be alert to the equal and opposite danger that public policy could
itself become the captive of a scientific-technological elite.
It is the task of statesmanship to mold, to balance, and to integrate these and other forces, new and old, within the principles of our
democratic system -- ever aiming toward the supreme goals of our free society.
V.
Another factor in maintaining balance involves the element of time. As we peer into society's future, we -- you and I, and our government --
must avoid the impulse to live only for today, plundering, for our own ease and convenience, the precious resources of tomorrow. We cannot
mortgage the material assets of our grandchildren without risking the loss also of their political and spiritual heritage. We want democracy to
survive for all generations to come, not to become the insolvent phantom of tomorrow.
VI.
Down the long lane of the history yet to be written America knows that this world of ours, ever growing smaller, must avoid becoming a
community of dreadful fear and hate, and be instead, a proud confederation of mutual trust and respect. Such a confederation must be one
of equals. The weakest must come to the conference table with the same confidence as do we, protected as we are by our moral, economic,
and military strength. That table, though scarred by many past frustrations, cannot be abandoned for the certain agony of the battlefield.
Disarmament, with mutual honor and confidence, is a continuing imperative. Together we must learn how to compose differences, not with
arms, but with intellect and decent purpose. Because this need is so sharp and apparent I confess that I lay down my official responsibilities in
this field with a definite sense of disappointment. As one who has witnessed the horror and the lingering sadness of war -- as one who
knows that another war could utterly destroy this civilization which has been so slowly and painfully built over thousands of years -- I wish I
could say tonight that a lasting peace is in sight. Happily, I can say that war has been avoided. Steady progress toward our ultimate goal has
been made. But, so much remains to be done. As a private citizen, I shall never cease to do what little I can to help the world advance along
that road.
VII.
So -- in this my last good night to you as your President -- I thank you for the many opportunities you have given me for public service in war
and peace. I trust that in that service you find some things worthy; as for the rest of it, I know you will find ways to improve performance in the
future.You and I -- my fellow citizens -- need to be strong in our faith that all nations, under God, will reach the goal of peace with justice. May
we be ever unswerving in devotion to principle, confident but humble with power, diligent in pursuit of the Nation's great goals. To all the
peoples of the world, I once more give expression to America's prayerful and continuing aspiration: We pray that peoples of all faiths, all
races, all nations, may have their great human needs satisfied; that those now denied opportunity shall come to enjoy it to the full; that all who
yearn for freedom may experience its spiritual blessings; that those who have freedom will understand, also, its heavy responsibilities; that all
who are insensitive to the needs of others will learn charity; that the scourges of poverty, disease and ignorance will be made to disappear
from the earth, and that, in the goodness of time, all peoples will come to live together in a peace guaranteed by the binding force of mutual
respect and love.”1
Despite this warning from our great president who successfully led the Allies in the global fight against fascism, our nation continues to use
defense spending to stimulate the economy and maintain global hegemony. His warning was ignored. Before Vietnam, Kennedy and Nixon
debated a "missile gap". Vietnam was where America slaughtered over two million people. More bombs were dropped on this poor country
than all of the ordinance used in World War II. From the safe distance of time, the defense contractors made some very serious money in this
war. There was full employment and Wall Street was happy with the corporate profits increasing at the tax payer expense.
Sometimes life will surprise us. I remember being in college and a clerk for Utah State Senator Francis Farley. I drafted the legislation for her
that opposed the MX weapons system from being deployed in Utah's west desert. This was in 1979. I never imagined that the Soviet Union
would collapse. I knew from my research that they were not anywhere near as powerful as the mass media and the extreme right would
constantly make them appear. Despite the propaganda about the "great Soviet threat" and the Cold War, (the war on communism), the
Russians were not a match for the combined American, Japanese and European economies. China remained a hostile neighbor and the
memories of 20 million dead and millions more wounded from the Nazi invasion were still fresh in the minds of their leaders. When the Soviet
Union fell apart, I hoped that defense spending would not take such a bite out of the taxpayer's budget. That hope was short lived. America
no longer had an "arms race" from a cold war gone cold. A new enemy would be required to justify such massive defense budgets. A new war
that could carry the public imagination, create fear, appeal to patriotism and enhance the bottom line of the defense contractors. And that is
exactly what the "War on Terror" has accomplished. America and the world is not "safer" or more secure from this Iraq conflict. The winners in
this war are the defense contractors who make and sell the weapons at the taxpayers' expense. Vietnam cost over two million
lives and over $530 Billion dollars. 2
I remember being a Catholic alter boy during the Vietnam war. I helped bury this young man whose family was crying. "He served his country"
the priest proclaimed as he was quietly laid into his final resting place to never know sun or cold, love or rain again. I remember looking at his
coffin, his parents, my friend who was crying as he was one of the altar boys and the priest. I asked myself, "how
did his death serve the country?".
Not included in the costs of the Iraq conflict is the suffering of the families who lose a loved one. Every day hundreds of Iraqi families suffer
the same fate shared by Americans when some psychopath goes into a work place or school and kill innocent people. The financial cost of
the Iraq conflict now exceeds $2 billion dollars per week. But with defense contractors or military installations in every congressional district,
until there is a new mission for the military industrial complex, the carnage will continue. If not in Iraq, then somewhere else. A world without
enemies would be an end to profits.
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
1. Public Papers of the Presidents, Dwight D. Eisenhower, 1960, p. 1035- 1040
2. SOURCE: 'WAR WITH IRAQ' (AMERICAN ACADEMY OF ARTS & SCIENCES); CSBA; SCOTT
WALLACE - STAFF online at: The Christian Science Monitor, August 29, 2005, "More costly than the war to
end all wars" by David R. Francis http://www.csmonitor.com/2005/0829/p15s01-cogn.html
Three days from now, after half a century in the service of our country, I shall lay down the responsibilities of office as, in traditional and
solemn ceremony the authority of the Presidency is vested in my successor. This evening I come to you with a message of leave-taking and
farewell, and to share a few final thoughts with you, my countrymen. Like every other citizen, I wish the new President, and all who will labor
with him, Godspeed. I pray that the coming years will be blessed with peace and prosperity for all. Our people expect their President and the
Congress to find essential agreement on issues of great moment, the wise resolution of which will better shape the future of the Nation.
My own relations with the Congress, which began on a remote and tenuous basis when, long ago, a member of the Senate appointed me to
West Point, have since ranged to the intimate during the war and immediate post-war period, and, finally, to the mutually interdependent
during these past eight years. In this final relationship, the Congress and the Administration have, on most vital issues, cooperated well to
serve the national good rather than mere partisanship, and so have assured that the business of the Nation should go forward. So, my official
relationship with the Congress ends in a feeling, on my part, of gratitude that we have been able to do so much together.
II.
We now stand ten years past the midpoint of a century that has witnessed four major wars among great nations. Three of these involved our
own country. Despite these holocausts America is today the strongest, the most influential and most productive nation in the world.
Understandably proud of this pre-eminence, we yet realize that America's leadership and prestige depend, not merely upon our unmatched
material progress, riches and military strength, but on how we use our power in the interests of world peace and human betterment.
III.
Throughout America's adventure in free government, our basic purposes have been to keep the peace; to foster progress in human
achievement, and to enhance liberty, dignity and integrity among people and among nations. To strive for less would be unworthy of a free
and religious people. Any failure traceable to arrogance, or our lack of comprehension or readiness to sacrifice would inflict upon us
grievous hurt both at home and abroad.
Progress toward these noble goals is persistently threatened by the conflict now engulfing the world. It commands our whole attention,
absorbs our very beings. We face a hostile ideology -- global in scope, atheistic in character, ruthless in purpose, and insidious in method.
Unhappily the danger is poses promises to be of indefinite duration. To meet it successfully, there is called for, not so much the
emotional and transitory sacrifices of crisis, but rather those which enable us to carry forward steadily, surely, and without complaint the
burdens of a prolonged and complex struggle -- with liberty the stake. Only thus shall we remain, despite every provocation, on our charted
course toward permanent peace and human betterment.
Crises there will continue to be. In meeting them, whether foreign or domestic, great or small, there is a recurring temptation to feel that some
spectacular and costly action could become the miraculous solution to all current difficulties. A huge increase in newer elements of our
defense; development of unrealistic programs to cure every ill in agriculture; a dramatic expansion in basic and applied research
-- these and many other possibilities, each possibly promising in itself, may be suggested as the only way to the road we wish to travel.
But each proposal must be weighed in the light of a broader consideration: the need to maintain balance in and among national programs --
balance between the private and the public economy, balance between cost and hoped for advantage -- balance between the clearly
necessary and the comfortably desirable; balance between our essential requirements as a nation and the duties imposed by the nation
upon the individual; balance between actions of the moment and the national welfare of the future. Good judgment seeks balance and
progress; lack of it eventually finds imbalance and frustration. The record of many decades stands as proof that our people and their
government have, in the main, understood these truths and have responded to them well, in the face of stress and threat. But threats,
new in kind or degree, constantly arise. I mention two only.
IV.
A vital element in keeping the peace is our military establishment. Our arms must be mighty, ready for instant action, so that no potential
aggressor may be tempted to risk his own destruction. Our military organization today bears little relation to that known by any of my
predecessors in peacetime, or indeed by the fighting men of World War II or Korea. Until the latest of our world conflicts, the United States
had no armaments industry. American makers of plowshares could, with time and as required, make swords as well. But now we can no longer
risk emergency improvisation of national defense; we have been compelled to create a permanent armaments industry of vast proportions.
Added to this, three and a half million men and women are directly engaged in the defense establishment. We annually spend on military
security more than the net income of all United States corporations.
This conjunction of an immense military establishment and a large arms industry is new in the American experience. The total influence --
economic, political, even spiritual -- is felt in every city, every State house, every office of the Federal government. We recognize the
imperative need for this development. Yet we must not fail to comprehend its grave implications. Our toil, resources and livelihood are all
involved; so is the very structure of our society. In the councils of government, we must guard against the acquisition of unwarranted
influence, whether sought or unsought, by the military-industrial complex. The potential for the disastrous rise of misplaced power exists and
will persist. (emphasis added).We must never let the weight of this combination endanger our liberties or democratic processes. We
should take nothing for granted. Only an alert and knowledgeable citizenry can compel the proper meshing of the huge industrial and military
machinery of defense with our peaceful methods and goals, so that security and liberty may prosper together.
Akin to, and largely responsible for the sweeping changes in our industrial-military posture, has been the technological revolution during
recent decades. In this revolution, research has become central; it also becomes more formalized, complex, and costly. A steadily increasing
share is conducted for, by, or at the direction of, the Federal government.
Today, the solitary inventor, tinkering in his shop, has been overshadowed by task forces of scientists in laboratories and testing fields. In the
same fashion, the free university, historically the fountainhead of free ideas and scientific discovery, has experienced a revolution in the
conduct of research. Partly because of the huge costs involved, a government contract becomes virtually a substitute for intellectual curiosity.
For every old blackboard there are now hundreds of new electronic computers. The prospect of domination of the nation's scholars by
Federal employment, project allocations, and the power of money is ever present and is gravely to be regarded. Yet, in holding scientific
research and discovery in respect, as we should, we must also be alert to the equal and opposite danger that public policy could
itself become the captive of a scientific-technological elite.
It is the task of statesmanship to mold, to balance, and to integrate these and other forces, new and old, within the principles of our
democratic system -- ever aiming toward the supreme goals of our free society.
V.
Another factor in maintaining balance involves the element of time. As we peer into society's future, we -- you and I, and our government --
must avoid the impulse to live only for today, plundering, for our own ease and convenience, the precious resources of tomorrow. We cannot
mortgage the material assets of our grandchildren without risking the loss also of their political and spiritual heritage. We want democracy to
survive for all generations to come, not to become the insolvent phantom of tomorrow.
VI.
Down the long lane of the history yet to be written America knows that this world of ours, ever growing smaller, must avoid becoming a
community of dreadful fear and hate, and be instead, a proud confederation of mutual trust and respect. Such a confederation must be one
of equals. The weakest must come to the conference table with the same confidence as do we, protected as we are by our moral, economic,
and military strength. That table, though scarred by many past frustrations, cannot be abandoned for the certain agony of the battlefield.
Disarmament, with mutual honor and confidence, is a continuing imperative. Together we must learn how to compose differences, not with
arms, but with intellect and decent purpose. Because this need is so sharp and apparent I confess that I lay down my official responsibilities in
this field with a definite sense of disappointment. As one who has witnessed the horror and the lingering sadness of war -- as one who
knows that another war could utterly destroy this civilization which has been so slowly and painfully built over thousands of years -- I wish I
could say tonight that a lasting peace is in sight. Happily, I can say that war has been avoided. Steady progress toward our ultimate goal has
been made. But, so much remains to be done. As a private citizen, I shall never cease to do what little I can to help the world advance along
that road.
VII.
So -- in this my last good night to you as your President -- I thank you for the many opportunities you have given me for public service in war
and peace. I trust that in that service you find some things worthy; as for the rest of it, I know you will find ways to improve performance in the
future.You and I -- my fellow citizens -- need to be strong in our faith that all nations, under God, will reach the goal of peace with justice. May
we be ever unswerving in devotion to principle, confident but humble with power, diligent in pursuit of the Nation's great goals. To all the
peoples of the world, I once more give expression to America's prayerful and continuing aspiration: We pray that peoples of all faiths, all
races, all nations, may have their great human needs satisfied; that those now denied opportunity shall come to enjoy it to the full; that all who
yearn for freedom may experience its spiritual blessings; that those who have freedom will understand, also, its heavy responsibilities; that all
who are insensitive to the needs of others will learn charity; that the scourges of poverty, disease and ignorance will be made to disappear
from the earth, and that, in the goodness of time, all peoples will come to live together in a peace guaranteed by the binding force of mutual
respect and love.”1
Despite this warning from our great president who successfully led the Allies in the global fight against fascism, our nation continues to use
defense spending to stimulate the economy and maintain global hegemony. His warning was ignored. Before Vietnam, Kennedy and Nixon
debated a "missile gap". Vietnam was where America slaughtered over two million people. More bombs were dropped on this poor country
than all of the ordinance used in World War II. From the safe distance of time, the defense contractors made some very serious money in this
war. There was full employment and Wall Street was happy with the corporate profits increasing at the tax payer expense.
Sometimes life will surprise us. I remember being in college and a clerk for Utah State Senator Francis Farley. I drafted the legislation for her
that opposed the MX weapons system from being deployed in Utah's west desert. This was in 1979. I never imagined that the Soviet Union
would collapse. I knew from my research that they were not anywhere near as powerful as the mass media and the extreme right would
constantly make them appear. Despite the propaganda about the "great Soviet threat" and the Cold War, (the war on communism), the
Russians were not a match for the combined American, Japanese and European economies. China remained a hostile neighbor and the
memories of 20 million dead and millions more wounded from the Nazi invasion were still fresh in the minds of their leaders. When the Soviet
Union fell apart, I hoped that defense spending would not take such a bite out of the taxpayer's budget. That hope was short lived. America
no longer had an "arms race" from a cold war gone cold. A new enemy would be required to justify such massive defense budgets. A new war
that could carry the public imagination, create fear, appeal to patriotism and enhance the bottom line of the defense contractors. And that is
exactly what the "War on Terror" has accomplished. America and the world is not "safer" or more secure from this Iraq conflict. The winners in
this war are the defense contractors who make and sell the weapons at the taxpayers' expense. Vietnam cost over two million
lives and over $530 Billion dollars. 2
I remember being a Catholic alter boy during the Vietnam war. I helped bury this young man whose family was crying. "He served his country"
the priest proclaimed as he was quietly laid into his final resting place to never know sun or cold, love or rain again. I remember looking at his
coffin, his parents, my friend who was crying as he was one of the altar boys and the priest. I asked myself, "how
did his death serve the country?".
Not included in the costs of the Iraq conflict is the suffering of the families who lose a loved one. Every day hundreds of Iraqi families suffer
the same fate shared by Americans when some psychopath goes into a work place or school and kill innocent people. The financial cost of
the Iraq conflict now exceeds $2 billion dollars per week. But with defense contractors or military installations in every congressional district,
until there is a new mission for the military industrial complex, the carnage will continue. If not in Iraq, then somewhere else. A world without
enemies would be an end to profits.
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
1. Public Papers of the Presidents, Dwight D. Eisenhower, 1960, p. 1035- 1040
2. SOURCE: 'WAR WITH IRAQ' (AMERICAN ACADEMY OF ARTS & SCIENCES); CSBA; SCOTT
WALLACE - STAFF online at: The Christian Science Monitor, August 29, 2005, "More costly than the war to
end all wars" by David R. Francis http://www.csmonitor.com/2005/0829/p15s01-cogn.html
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