Soldiers’ Lament; Music: Angel’s Lament From The River CD (6:36)
Marine Corps Col. Peter Martino At Concord, NH, Town Council Meeting (8/20/2013):
“What’s happening here is that we’re building a domestic military because it’s unlawful or unconstitutional to use American troops on American soil.
My best friend, who’s a SWAT officer in Nashua, who came to Iraq with me to train the Iraqi police, sent me an email with a picture of him in the media on the streets of Watertown, MA wearing the exact same combat gear that we had in Iraq, only it was a different color. And the way we do things in the military, it’s called task organization: You take a command, and then you attach units to it in order to accomplish the mission. What’s happening is that Homeland Security is pre-staging gear, equipment. They’re trying to use standardized vehicles, standardized equipment.
I saw a picture in the Boston Globe during the Marathon Bombing where there was a state police officer– Actually, there were two officers. They both had identical helmets, flak jackets, weapons, everything I wore in Iraq, only it was all blue. The officer on one side had a big patch on his back that said “MASSACHUSETTS STATE POLICE.” Another officer next to him, his patch said “BOSTON POLICE.”
So what we’re doing here, and let’s not kid about it, we’re building a domestic army and we’re shrinking the military because the government is afraid of its own citizens. We’re building an Army over here and I can’t believe that people aren’t seeing it. Is everybody blind?”
II. From President Dwight D. Eisenhower’s Farewell Speech (January 17, 1961):
In the councils of government, we must guard against the acquisition of unwarranted influence, whether sought or unsought, by the military-Congressional-industrial complex. The potential for the disastrous rise of misplaced power exists and will persist.
We have been compelled to create a permanent armaments industry of vast proportions. Added to this, three and a half million men and women are directly engaged in the defense establishment. We annually spend on military security more than the net income of all United States corporations.
This conjunction of an immense military establishment and a large arms industry is new in the American experience. The total influence – economic, political, even spiritual – is felt in every city, every Statehouse, every office of the Federal government. We recognize the imperative need for this development. Yet we must not fail to comprehend its grave implications. Our toil, resources and livelihood are all involved; so is the very structure of our society.
Every gun that is made, every warship launched, every rocket fired, signifies, in the final sense, a theft from those who hunger and are not fed, those who are cold and are not clothed. The world in arms is not spending money alone. It is spending the sweat of its laborers, the genius of its scientists, the hopes of its children.
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 the huge industrial and military machinery of defense with our peaceful methods and goals, so that security and liberty may prosper together.
Akin to, and largely responsible for the sweeping changes in our industrial-military posture, has been the technological revolution during recent decades. In this revolution, research has become central, it also becomes more formalized, complex, and costly. A steadily increasing share is conducted for, by, or at the direction of, the Federal government.
…The prospect of domination of the nation’s scholars by Federal employment, project allocations, and the power of money is ever present – and is gravely to be regarded…. we must be alert to the danger that public policy could itself become the captive of a scientific-technological elite.”
III. In his 1933 book, “War is a Racket” and a related speech, retired Brigidier General Smedley D. Butler, US Marine Corps (America’s most decorated soldier), stated:
“I spent 33 years in the Marines, most of my time being a high-class muscleman for big business, for Wall Street and the bankers. In short, I was a racketeer for capitalism.
Every war which Americans have fought or may fight in the future outside their own continental boundaries has been or will be a racket- a mean, cruel, yes, filthy racket. During our participation in the World War (I), our soldiers thought they were fighting to defend their homes, to make the world safe for democracy, we’re fighting a war to end wars. Rot. Pure, unadulterated sickening rot!
War is largely a matter of money. Bankers lend the money to foreign countries and when they cannot pay, the President sends Marines to get it.
Why don’t those damned oil companies fly their own flags on their personal property- maybe a flag with a gas pump on it.
I believe in adequate defense at the coastline and nothing else.