When I was growing up in
Wisconsin, the school history texts told us that the most prominent politician
to come out of the state was Robert “Fighting Bob” La Follette, and for good
reason. As governor and U.S. senator, he was the leader of the progressive
party that was Republican in name only. For La Follette, the world was a battle
between “the people” and the “selfish interests,” or laborers and farmers
against corporations and their millionaire stooges in Congress. He pushed for tax
reform, business and finance regulation, labor rights and the curbing of the
“rights” of the powerful to influence elections and the legislative agenda long
before the Great Depression made the need for it “popular.”
But La Follette ran afoul of
popular sentiment in regard to the U.S.’ entry into World War I. Not that his reasoning for doing so had no
basis in fact. The U.S. did frequently intervene in foreign countries solely for
the purpose of protecting the interests of American businesses. For those who
doubt this, I have already quoted Gen. Smedley Butler—as self-described “muscle
man” for corporate interests—from his pamphlet War is a Racket:
I spent 33 years and four months in active military service and during
that period I spent most of my time as a high class muscle man for Big
Business, for Wall Street and the bankers. In short, I was a racketeer, a
gangster for capitalism. I helped make Mexico and 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 benefit of Wall Street. I helped
purify Nicaragua for the International Banking House of Brown Brothers in
1902-1912. I brought light to the Dominican Republic for the American sugar
interests in 1916. I helped make Honduras right for the American fruit
companies in 1903. In China in 1927 I helped see to it that Standard Oil went
on its way unmolested. Looking back on it, I might have given Al Capone a few
hints. The best he could do was to operate his racket in three districts. I
operated on three continents."
La Follette believed that
corporations and business interests were pushing the U.S. to war in the hope of
profiting by it (the U.S. certainly had no direct “interest” in involving
itself in what was essentially the usual European struggle to maintain
“equilibrium” between the leading states). Once war against Germany was
declared, partly in response to the sinking of the Lusitania, a British
passenger liner out of New York that was also carrying nearly 200 tons of war
munitions (technically violating the U.S. claim of “neutrality” up to that
point), which likely caused the massive explosion and led to the loss of life
of over 1,000 people. La Follette—besides opposing the draft, attempted and
failed to convince Congress to force corporations to pay for U.S. war efforts,
since they were the ones profiting by it.
But pro-war advocates labeled La
Follette a “traitor” and pushed for his expulsion from the U.S. Senate. The
effort failed, but he was essentially a public pariah for several years after
the “successful” conclusion of the World War I. But public opinion would change
when people realized that he was correct in claiming that the unjust
“settlement” of the “war to end all wars” would only lead to another—and
probably even worse—war. The victorious allies imposed an impossible burden on
Germany alone to pay war reparations in the hopes of destroying forever its
military capacity; instead of doing that, the West only made conditions
impossible for Germans to accept “democracy” and give credibility to avowed
democrats, who were viewed a stooges and traitors in allowing the country’s
foreign—and Jewish—“enemies” to drive Germany into the ground. It might have
been different if economic conditions had improved with that of the rest of the
world in the 1920s and allowed Germans to believe in democracy as a viable form
of government, but Britain and France insisted on forcing Germany to pay $33
billion in war damages—obviously a staggering sum in 1919—and there was no hope
for recovery.
Thus when the Great Depression
hit, it was especially crushing on Germany, and thus the rise of the Nazis and
the search for external and internal scapegoats was not unexpected. And of
course for a people that believed itself unjustly punished by the Western
powers, revenge was never far from the national mindset. War was still not
necessarily inevitably, but after foolishly trying to “crush” Germany into a
militarily weak state, the allies themselves became weak in enforcing the terms
of the Versailles Treaty, apparently in the belief that treating Hitler with
kid gloves would “soften” him and sate his expansionist tendencies. It did not.
Moral questions aside, think about this: No outrageous imposition of
reparations that stunted economic recovery, no Nazis or Hitler, no war, no
Holocaust, very likely no founding of the state of Israel, no Islamic jihadist
reaction to the West’s support of it.
And American corporations
rejoiced at the entry of the U.S. into the World War II. The fact was that the
U.S. was still far from completely recovered from the Depression in 1941, and
the “recovery” of the economy that would soon occur did so on the back of
massive government spending on military-affiliated activities. After the war,
the economy went into a downspin following diminished military expenditures,
but recovered somewhat with the beginning of the so-called “Cold War.” In Pres.
Dwight D. Eisenhower’s final address before leaving office, this former general
warned of the power of “military-industrial complex,” which he felt would
undermine American democracy and promote activities not in the country’s best
interest—like the Vietnam War.
Things have not changed since
then. The alleged economic “recovery” under Reagan was built on the back of
massive government military spending, failing to support domestic consumer
manufacturing that was disappearing in the face of foreign competition. Today,
former Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld claims that he never believed that
“democracy” would take in Iraq, but that didn’t stop the U.S. for engaging in
what now can be seen as a foolish endeavor that needlessly cost many thousands
of American lives. And who was among those who profited most from the Iraq War?
Halliburton, an oil and gas company which “expanded” into military-related
endeavors under the Bush administration—and its technically on leave CEO, Vice
President Dick Cheney, didn’t have anything
to do with it. Oh sure. Cheney was perfectly content to wait for his “deferred”
millions in compensation for directing military and oil contracts to his
“former” company.
Of course, war
profiteering and actually “winning” a war are two entirely different things.
The former only needs an ongoing war (such as a decade in Iraq and trillions in
“off-the-books” spending); the latter requires a cost in blood, which corporate
fat cats and rocking chair “warriors” regard as an “unfortunate” but
“unavoidable” outlay. With ISIS on the loose, it is clear that—as Eisenhower
stated—the interests of corporations and their political stooges are as often
as not in direct conflict with that of the national and public interest. But
Gen. Butler would hardly be surprised.
