War is a Racket

by General Smedley D. Butler

Nobody Listens

General Smedley Butler is notable for the mismatch in the importance of his story and the attention it got.

He was a highly decorated Marine general who was actively engaged in most of America's military engagements from 1898 to the 1920's. He later wrote a powerful indictment of those engagements in a book titled War is a Racket. It did not make a huge stir when published and is mostly forgotten today. In the 1930's, he blew the whistle on a plot to depose Franklin Roosevelt in a facsist takeover. This was a serious plot, but it was downplayed by most of the news organs of the time.

In spite of a career filled with drama and public prominence, there is a single biography about him and little published elsewhere. Part of the problem is that he does not fit the conventional political spectrum. He was very much a gung-ho career Marine who won a number of combat medals a fought in wars from China to Haiti. He was also one of the most prominent anti-war and anti-fascist voices in the years between the World Wars. Thus, the pacifists didn't really like him because he was a soldier and the militarists didn't like him because he said the wrong things.

That leaves it up to us. We are now coming to the end (we hope) of a twenty-year cycle of contiunous overseas wars. I have seen the figure of 2 trillion dollars for the total cost. Where did all that money go? Who has it now?

On a related note, Dwight Eisnehower in his fairwell address said "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. 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 huge industrial and military machinery of defense with our peaceful methods and goals, so that security and liberty may prosper together." He had nothing to prove or gain and this was the message he thought most important.

And sixty years later, after Vietnam, Guatemala, Iraq, and Afghanistan, we can clearly see that nobody listened to either of them.