Harry Targ
(Check out this update first)
https://www.dontbankonthebomb.com/at-great-cost/
An Old analysis that still holds:
Reconstituting the Military/Industrial/Academic Complex: An Update
The essay below was originally posted at / The Rag Blog /
March 18, 2012 (military spending was updated to fiscal year 2026). Military
policies have not much changed since the onset of the Cold War).
The James Forrestal Industry
Leadership Award is named in honor of James Forrestal, who has served as
secretary of the Navy and of Defense. The Forrestal Award honors his leadership
and outspoken advocacy for a robust and responsive defense industrial base
during the painful early years of post-World War II demobilization. The
Forrestal Award is bestowed annually on a person who best reflects Forrestal's
vision, leadership, and staunch support of a strong industrial base
(NDIA100, ndia.org).
https://www.warresisters.org/resources/pie-chart-flyers-where-your-income-tax-money-really-goes/
Poor are paying the
price: Military spending and
our national priorities
"From Forrestal’s day to the
present, semi-warriors have viewed democratic politics as problematic. Debate
means delay. To engage in give-and-take or compromise is to forfeit clarity and
suggests a lack of conviction. The effective management of national security
requires specialized knowledge, a capacity for clear-eyed analysis and above
all an unflinching willingness to make decisions, whatever the cost. With the
advent of the semi-war, therefore, national security policy became the preserve
of experts, few in number, almost always unelected, habitually operating in
secret, persuading themselves that to exclude the public from such matters was
to serve the public interest. After all, the people had no demonstrable 'need
to know.' In a time of perpetual crisis, the anointed role of the citizen was
to be pliant, deferential and afraid.” -- Andrew Bacevich,
reviewing a biography of James Forrestal, the first Secretary of Defense, in The
Nation.
Andrew Bacevich reminds us that a
permanent war economy has been part of the political and economic landscape of
the United States at least since the end of World War II. The War Resisters
League pie chart of total government spending for fiscal year 2026 (see the
link above) indicates that the projected Trump budget projects that 50 percent of all government spending will deal with
current and past military costs. Despite lower government estimates that mask
true military spending, by adding the Social Security Trust Fund to total
spending and regarding past military spending -- particularly veteran’s
benefits -- as non-military, it is clear that roughly 50 cents of every dollar
goes to war, war preparation, covert operations, and military contractors. In
addition, “war support” contractors such as KBR have made billions of dollars
in the twenty-first century from military spending.
Top producers of military hardware
Lockheed Martin, Northrop Grumman, and Boeing earned 11, 8, and 5 billion
dollars in contracts in 2010 alone. Ostensibly non-military corporations such
as BP, FedEx, Dell, Kraft, and Pepsi received hundreds of millions of dollars
in defense contracts in 2010. Virtually every big corporation is to some degree
on the Department of Defense payroll. A recent data-based report, “Don’t Bank
on the Bomb,” prepared by the International Campaign to Abolish Nuclear Weapons
(ICAN), identified “more than 300 banks, insurance companies, pension funds and
asset managers from 30 countries that invest significantly in 20 major nuclear
weapons producers.”
The report examined in detail
financial connections to 20 major nuclear weapons companies. (and see the link above to the updated don't bank on the bomb report). These 20 included
U.S. producers of nuclear weapons components such as Bechtel, Boeing, GenCorp,
General Dynamics, Honeywell, and Northrop Grumman. U.S. financial institutions
investing in the nuclear weapons producers included Abrams Bison Investments,
AIG, American National Insurance Company, Fidelity, Franklin Templeton, JP
Morgan Chase, New York Life, and Prudential Financial. Because of the economic
crisis which began in 2007, debate about military spending has increased.
