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I started paying attention to this when I lived close to DC around 2002. Bush was cutting the top tax brackets while ramping up for the Iraq invasion, the defe

I started paying attention to this when I lived close to DC around 2002. Bush was cutting the top tax brackets while ramping up for the Iraq invasion, the defense contractors made record profits (I remember one CEO making around 30 million) and the DC metro was plastered with ads touting the patriotism of the defense contractors. I thought "these guys are making record money, are getting their taxes reduced, try to look like patriots and some clueless young guys have to go to war and die". Since then I honestly think there should be no profit in making weapons while a war is going. It's just not right that some people are raking in the big money without risk while some poor guys have to go and die.

Diesel555 5y ago
“War is an ugly thing, but not the ugliest of things: the decayed and degraded state of moral and patriotic feeling which thinks that nothing is worth a war, is much worse. When a people are used as mere human instruments for firing cannon or thrusting bayonets, in the service and for the selfish purposes of a master, such war degrades a people. A war to protect other human beings against tyrannical injustice; a war to give victory to their own ideas of right and good, and which is their own war, carried on for an honest purpose by their free choice, — is often the means of their regeneration. A man who has nothing which he is willing to fight for, nothing which he cares more about than he does about his personal safety, is a miserable creature who has no chance of being free, unless made and kept so by the exertions of better men than himself. As long as justice and injustice have not terminated their ever-renewing fight for ascendancy in the affairs of mankind, human beings must be willing, when need is, to do battle for the one against the other.” - John Stuart Mill
- orestarod 5y ago
  You must agree that, by the standards of this paragraph, most wars waged by people should first be against their own current leaders.
landemva 5y ago
USA loves armed conflict so much it pays the EU to run their junior league fighters NATO. Just can't get enough of it.
- lifeplusplus 5y ago
  money laundering at bigger scale... tax -> war -> defense budget -> military complex manufacturers
  - anm89 5y ago
    The idea of a government, especially the US, laundering money doesn't really make any sense. Generally, the point of laundering money is to pay taxes on it so it can enter the financial system. Governments (and especially the US who has the most control of international monetary pipelines like SWIFT) can freely do what they want with their money generally, at least within their own countries. Their money is going to make it into the financial system without any laundering.
    - SturgeonsLaw 5y ago
      Laundering as a term might not be a good fit, but the parent comment's main claim that war is a vehicle for moving public money into private pockets is absolutely correct
      - anm89 5y ago
        Agree but we have other words specifically for that: grift, corruption, kickbacks. War is definitely a racket but that racket isn't money laundering. The racket isn't about obfuscating the origin of the money but to direct it to certain parties
    - lifeplusplus 5y ago
      it does, the point is take tax revenue and transfer it to rich buddies, now if it requires starting wars and spending trillions, so be it as long as your buddies end up getting few trillions from it
roenxi 5y ago
> Since then I honestly think there should be no profit in making weapons while a war is going. It is an interesting thought but ... if the government tells the industrial chain "you aren't getting paid for this" then there is a pretty high chance the war will be lost. Being optimistic, maybe it could work for one war. Then the next war people ask "where are our weapons?" and the answer is "there are none". There is really only one solution to DC's warmongering - someone needs to be held accountable for constantly lying and sleepwalking the US into wars. And not the weapons manufacturers, the actual politicians who are pretending that they didn't realise there were billions-to-trillions being sunk into blowing up taxpayer dollars to kill random goat herders. The public seems pretty peaceful, anti-war rhetoric has been doing well for a while. They just keep getting distracted by political issues (which are obvious distractions if you look at them in context of the US's defence & fiscal policies).
- eru 5y ago
  Don't they have elections for that purpose?
  - hilbert42 5y ago
    The should, but with modern politics such matters are only ever skirted around the edges. The real issues nearly always remain unresolved.
- jessaustin 5y ago
  ...then there is a pretty high chance the war will be lost. That is the status quo. USA military has not won a war in my parents' lifetimes. USA military is optimized to consume resources, not to accomplish traditional military objectives.
  - spaetzleesser 5y ago
    The first Iraq war could be considered a victory. Clear objectives, once achieved the war stopped. Bush Sr was smart enough not to expand the war although a lot of people were pushing for a march into Baghdad.
mercy_dude 5y ago
The music stops the day USD losses it’s reserve currency status. Which there is a good chance of us seeing in your lifetime.
- vixen99 5y ago
  With respect, you mean 'The music stops the day USD loses its reserve currency status.'.
scyzoryk_xyz 5y ago
*some clueless young guys have to go and kill untold numbers of innocent people in another country. It never ceases to amaze me how citizens of the USA place the vast majority of sympathy to their beloved “troops” and barely any on those who actually get invaded.
- MrYellowP 5y ago
  Why's that amazing? The media dictates what most people talk about, and how they do it. Never noticed how topics switch over time depending on what's in the news? That's what people talk about! News switches the main topic, people switch the main topic. The old topic becomes forgotten and it does so quickly. If you take a closer look, you'll even see that they talk about the thoughts they've read, in the perspective they've received read them. I have little reason to assume it's not like this everywhere. There will always a part who disagrees, but it will always be a minority compared to the masses, which creates beneficial controversy and keeps people arguing.
  - tsol 5y ago
    Even television and entertainment play a huge part. They introduce and normalize issues, and in that way shift the borders of the overton window. It's strange how much of culture is, in a sense, manufactured. With the internet, at least there are some places where you can go to have open conversations now
    - MrYellowP 5y ago
      Those places become less and less, actually. I've found more and more places where people, under the umbrella of doing good, dictate what's allowed to be said. Often it's not even the actual admins of the channels, but a mob of people outraged-on-behalf-of-others. Powerhungry assholes.
  - orbifold 5y ago
    It is kind of fun to just not follow national news and then get into conversations with relatives / friends that do. Most conversations are really pre-programmed including the views that they will have. "Telegram is bad because it is used by extremists" for example. The most egregious example being COVID of course. The different national narratives were slightly out of sync at all times, so that people got told the Vaccines were effective at preventing infection, spread and the "way out", while at the same time another country was already running Booster programs because two doses were not enough and weren't even effectively preventing hospitalisations after 6 months.
d0mine 5y ago
selling guns is just a side business, the actual profit is in: "I helped make Mexico, especially Tampico, safe for American oil interests in 1914. I helped make Haiti and Cuba a decent place for the National City Bank boys to collect revenues in. I helped in the raping of half a dozen Central American republics for the benefits of Wall Street. The record of racketeering is long. I helped purify Nicaragua for the international banking house of Brown Brothers in 1909-1912 (where have I heard that name before?). I brought light to the Dominican Republic for American sugar interests in 1916. In China I helped to see to it that Standard Oil went its way unmolested."
einpoklum 5y ago
> Since then I honestly think there should be no profit in making weapons while a war is going. Why should the weapons manufacturers be left out while oil companies, mercenary corps, and construction/logistics companies get all of the action? "Everybody" deserves their place at the feeding trough.
- spaetzleesser 5y ago
  Maybe once a war starts officially the whole economy should go into a non profit mode. I think that would make a lot of people much less interested in waging wars.

Diesel555 5y ago

“War is an ugly thing, but not the ugliest of things: the decayed and degraded state of moral and patriotic feeling which thinks that nothing is worth a war, is much worse. When a people are used as mere human instruments for firing cannon or thrusting bayonets, in the service and for the selfish purposes of a master, such war degrades a people. A war to protect other human beings against tyrannical injustice; a war to give victory to their own ideas of right and good, and which is their own war, carried on for an honest purpose by their free choice, — is often the means of their regeneration. A man who has nothing which he is willing to fight for, nothing which he cares more about than he does about his personal safety, is a miserable creature who has no chance of being free, unless made and kept so by the exertions of better men than himself. As long as justice and injustice have not terminated their ever-renewing fight for ascendancy in the affairs of mankind, human beings must be willing, when need is, to do battle for the one against the other.” - John Stuart Mill

orestarod 5y ago
You must agree that, by the standards of this paragraph, most wars waged by people should first be against their own current leaders.

landemva 5y ago

USA loves armed conflict so much it pays the EU to run their junior league fighters NATO. Just can't get enough of it.

lifeplusplus 5y ago
money laundering at bigger scale... tax -> war -> defense budget -> military complex manufacturers
- anm89 5y ago
  The idea of a government, especially the US, laundering money doesn't really make any sense. Generally, the point of laundering money is to pay taxes on it so it can enter the financial system. Governments (and especially the US who has the most control of international monetary pipelines like SWIFT) can freely do what they want with their money generally, at least within their own countries. Their money is going to make it into the financial system without any laundering.
  - SturgeonsLaw 5y ago
    Laundering as a term might not be a good fit, but the parent comment's main claim that war is a vehicle for moving public money into private pockets is absolutely correct
    - anm89 5y ago
      Agree but we have other words specifically for that: grift, corruption, kickbacks. War is definitely a racket but that racket isn't money laundering. The racket isn't about obfuscating the origin of the money but to direct it to certain parties
  - lifeplusplus 5y ago
    it does, the point is take tax revenue and transfer it to rich buddies, now if it requires starting wars and spending trillions, so be it as long as your buddies end up getting few trillions from it

roenxi 5y ago

> Since then I honestly think there should be no profit in making weapons while a war is going. It is an interesting thought but ... if the government tells the industrial chain "you aren't getting paid for this" then there is a pretty high chance the war will be lost. Being optimistic, maybe it could work for one war. Then the next war people ask "where are our weapons?" and the answer is "there are none". There is really only one solution to DC's warmongering - someone needs to be held accountable for constantly lying and sleepwalking the US into wars. And not the weapons manufacturers, the actual politicians who are pretending that they didn't realise there were billions-to-trillions being sunk into blowing up taxpayer dollars to kill random goat herders. The public seems pretty peaceful, anti-war rhetoric has been doing well for a while. They just keep getting distracted by political issues (which are obvious distractions if you look at them in context of the US's defence & fiscal policies).

eru 5y ago
Don't they have elections for that purpose?
- hilbert42 5y ago
  The should, but with modern politics such matters are only ever skirted around the edges. The real issues nearly always remain unresolved.
jessaustin 5y ago
...then there is a pretty high chance the war will be lost. That is the status quo. USA military has not won a war in my parents' lifetimes. USA military is optimized to consume resources, not to accomplish traditional military objectives.
- spaetzleesser 5y ago
  The first Iraq war could be considered a victory. Clear objectives, once achieved the war stopped. Bush Sr was smart enough not to expand the war although a lot of people were pushing for a march into Baghdad.

mercy_dude 5y ago

The music stops the day USD losses it’s reserve currency status. Which there is a good chance of us seeing in your lifetime.

vixen99 5y ago
With respect, you mean 'The music stops the day USD loses its reserve currency status.'.

scyzoryk_xyz 5y ago

*some clueless young guys have to go and kill untold numbers of innocent people in another country. It never ceases to amaze me how citizens of the USA place the vast majority of sympathy to their beloved “troops” and barely any on those who actually get invaded.

MrYellowP 5y ago
Why's that amazing? The media dictates what most people talk about, and how they do it. Never noticed how topics switch over time depending on what's in the news? That's what people talk about! News switches the main topic, people switch the main topic. The old topic becomes forgotten and it does so quickly. If you take a closer look, you'll even see that they talk about the thoughts they've read, in the perspective they've received read them. I have little reason to assume it's not like this everywhere. There will always a part who disagrees, but it will always be a minority compared to the masses, which creates beneficial controversy and keeps people arguing.
- tsol 5y ago
  Even television and entertainment play a huge part. They introduce and normalize issues, and in that way shift the borders of the overton window. It's strange how much of culture is, in a sense, manufactured. With the internet, at least there are some places where you can go to have open conversations now
  - MrYellowP 5y ago
    Those places become less and less, actually. I've found more and more places where people, under the umbrella of doing good, dictate what's allowed to be said. Often it's not even the actual admins of the channels, but a mob of people outraged-on-behalf-of-others. Powerhungry assholes.
- orbifold 5y ago
  It is kind of fun to just not follow national news and then get into conversations with relatives / friends that do. Most conversations are really pre-programmed including the views that they will have. "Telegram is bad because it is used by extremists" for example. The most egregious example being COVID of course. The different national narratives were slightly out of sync at all times, so that people got told the Vaccines were effective at preventing infection, spread and the "way out", while at the same time another country was already running Booster programs because two doses were not enough and weren't even effectively preventing hospitalisations after 6 months.

d0mine 5y ago

selling guns is just a side business, the actual profit is in: "I helped make Mexico, especially Tampico, safe for American oil interests in 1914. I helped make Haiti and Cuba a decent place for the National City Bank boys to collect revenues in. I helped in the raping of half a dozen Central American republics for the benefits of Wall Street. The record of racketeering is long. I helped purify Nicaragua for the international banking house of Brown Brothers in 1909-1912 (where have I heard that name before?). I brought light to the Dominican Republic for American sugar interests in 1916. In China I helped to see to it that Standard Oil went its way unmolested."

einpoklum 5y ago

> Since then I honestly think there should be no profit in making weapons while a war is going. Why should the weapons manufacturers be left out while oil companies, mercenary corps, and construction/logistics companies get all of the action? "Everybody" deserves their place at the feeding trough.

spaetzleesser 5y ago
Maybe once a war starts officially the whole economy should go into a non profit mode. I think that would make a lot of people much less interested in waging wars.