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War Expert Tells How It's Done and Why

Comment by Larry Ross, October 11, 2005

General Smedley Butler's 1933 speech is a classic that applies to Bush and his wars today. General Butler's worst fears have come true - this time with much larger annihilation devices at the command of Bush and his neocons. He gives many examples of the greatly inflated profits enjoyed by the wide range of manufacturers who make materials used in war - from munitions to warships to uniforms. Bush promised an endless "war on terror" to defend Democracy". He is delivering on this promise while creating a record-breaking national debt and enormous profits for the myriad of people and company's engaged in the runaway US war machine.

Bush has done all this on the basis of a litany of lies his neocon administration invented to justify the pre-planned wars on Afghanistan and Iraq. There is little doubt now that Iran, and perhaps Syria,will be next on Bush's hit list.

As Iran is much larger and better prepared than Iraq, and American forces are already bogged down in the Iraq quagmire, it is likely that Bush will create a justification for the Pentagon to use nuclear weapons against Iran. The US media will likely support him and whatever justification he dreams up - particularly if a new 9/11 is suddenly unleashed on the US people.

There are many articles on this site under "US War On Iran and Syria" that indicate that the Bush Administration is seriously considering attacking Iran and using nuclear weapons.

Smedley said World War I was sold to Americans as the "war to make the world safe for democracy" and the "war to end all wars". The same kind of phraseology is written by Bush's speech writers today - using all the tried and true American hot buttons - to continue Bush's phoney wars.

As General Smedley said so aptly: " War is a racket".

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War Is A Racket

Excerpt from a speech delivered in 1933, by Major General Smedley Butler, USMC.

WAR is a racket. It always has been

It is possibly the oldest, easily the most profitable, surely the most vicious. It is the only one international in scope. It is the only one in which the profits are reckoned in dollars and the losses in lives.

A racket is best described, I believe, as something that is not what it seems to the majority of the people. Only a small "inside" group knows what it is about. It is conducted for the benefit of the very few, at the expense of the very many. Out of war a few people make huge fortunes.

In the World War [I] a mere handful garnered the profits of the conflict. At least 21,000 new millionaires and billionaires were made in the United States during the World War. That many admitted their huge blood gains in their income tax returns. How many other war millionaires falsified their tax returns no one knows.

How many of these war millionaires shouldered a rifle? How many of them dug a trench? How many of them knew what it meant to go hungry in a rat-infested dug-out? How many of them spent sleepless, frightened nights, ducking shells and shrapnel and machine gun bullets? How many of them parried a bayonet thrust of an enemy? How many of them were wounded or killed in battle?        continue.......