A month ago or so I heard the devastating news. In a May 12, 2020, column in The Washington Post, David Ignatius let us know that the United States does not have military primacy over China.
In fact, says Ignatius, citing to a new book, The Kill Chain: Defending America in the Future of High-Tech Warfare, "in U.S. war games against China, the United States has a nearly perfect record: We have lost almost every single time.” Ignatius goes on to say that this book is not "just a wake-up call, it's a fire alarm in the night."
The United States spends nearly one trillion dollars a year on what the government denotes as "defense," and yet all that money has not given us the "primacy" that Ignatius thinks should accompany such massive expenditures.
In one of my recent blog posts, I cited to Noam Chomsky in "Who Rules The World?" That book makes clear that the United States military is not, actually, oriented to "defense." It is oriented to world domination, up to and including terrorism. That's where those trillions are going.
Since all that money is not giving us the "primacy" that Ignatius thinks we deserve, could we consider another strategy? Instead of trying to have the kind of "primacy" that will allow the United States to rule the world, let's cut back on all that military expenditure, and spend only for items that are truly and uniquely focused on "defending" the United States from direct attacks made on our country from outside, and/or use that money for projects that would improve public health and safety, and restore and refurbish our failing infrastructure.
If we did that, we could let others compete for primacy elsewhere. How's that for an idea?
A picture I saw on Facebook, relating to the coronavirus crisis, is true in other contexts, too. Think about the message conveyed by this wall-size poster art. It's time for a change, and giving up our quest for military "primacy" and world domination could let us succeed in many other areas more worthy of our attention - areas much more close to home!
Since all that money is not giving us the "primacy" that Ignatius thinks we deserve, could we consider another strategy? Instead of trying to have the kind of "primacy" that will allow the United States to rule the world, let's cut back on all that military expenditure, and spend only for items that are truly and uniquely focused on "defending" the United States from direct attacks made on our country from outside, and/or use that money for projects that would improve public health and safety, and restore and refurbish our failing infrastructure.
If we did that, we could let others compete for primacy elsewhere. How's that for an idea?
A picture I saw on Facebook, relating to the coronavirus crisis, is true in other contexts, too. Think about the message conveyed by this wall-size poster art. It's time for a change, and giving up our quest for military "primacy" and world domination could let us succeed in many other areas more worthy of our attention - areas much more close to home!
Image Credits:
(1) - https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/global-opinions/think-we-have-military-primacy-over-china-think-again/2020/05/12/268e1bba-948b-11ea-9f5e-56d8239bf9ad_story.html
(2) - https://www.facebook.com/GreenNewDeal/
(2) - https://www.facebook.com/GreenNewDeal/
Love it.
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