How Sputnik Contributed to the Marriage of Science and Weaponry
When the Soviet Union launched the world’s first artificial satellite on Oct. 4, 1957, American horizons darkened with self-reproach and fear. Sputnik was a shock to the system. “The fact that we have lost the race to launch the satellite means that we are losing the race to produce ballistic missiles,” the influential columnist Walter Lippmann wrote. At a diplomatic party, when an official in the Eisenhower administration commented that Sputnik would be forgotten in six months, Washington’s famed hostess-with-the-mostest Perle Mesta shot back: “And in six months, we may all be dead.”
Yet we all know the fabled story line: A resilient America rose to the challenge and bested the Soviets in space. A dozen years after its propaganda perigee, the United States landed a man on the moon. And the nation’s zeal for cutting-edge technology continues to shape the American experience.
But the triumphant story line bypasses a shadowy continuum of the last five decades.
Sometimes even authorities voiced misgivings. At the end of a presidency that proudly developed the latest doomsday weaponry, Dwight Eisenhower delivered a surprising farewell address that warned against a “military-industrial complex.” Less famously, in the same speech, he also warned that “public policy could itself become the captive of a scientific-technological elite.”
In a 1967 speech, Martin Luther King Jr. aptly described a society going off-course: “When scientific power outruns moral power, we end up with guided missiles and misguided men.” The U.S. war effort in Vietnam was making the most of new computer technology - on behalf of policy priorities that fueled a backlash from many in the baby-boom generation. Millions of young Americans began to view their elders as depraved and their upbringings as hollow. The poses of objectivity and science-based wisdom were losing their appeal for many who began to look at the customary straight-and-narrow path as a grim forced march.
The two most memorable accomplishments of the 1960s for American aerospace were the moonwalk and the high-tech bombing that, among other benchmarks, managed to decimate vast expanses of Southeast Asia. From 238,000 miles away or a few thousand feet above the ground, Uncle Sam’s dominance of space and air was dazzling. The same patriotic persona taking a giant step for mankind on the moon was calling in nonstop air strikes on planet Earth.
But during the same decade, the preoccupations of more and more Baby Boomers ran directly counter to the emphasis that had shifted the U.S. space program into overdrive. Society’s crash course on a science trajectory was about learning and training to think in ways that would boost the quest for new technologies. In contrast, a lot of the emerging counterculture had to do with efforts to open doors of perception - feeling instead of just calculating - discovering and not just trying to solve intellectual puzzles.
Yet the dominant American responses to Sputnik had enduring impacts that propelled a “scientific-technological elite” to new heights of power. Technology was harnessed to a political economy that pulled the talents and even the dreams of new generations toward intense digital consumerism and acquiescence to the warfare state.
Sputnik accelerated a process that was already well under way 50 years ago. Schools were to produce America’s intellectual pistons for the space race and the broader arms race. As the atomic physicist Philip Morrison had predicted in 1946, federal largesse would deftly hook the nation’s colleges into active compliance. “The now amicable contracts will tighten up and the fine print will start to contain talk about results and specific weapon problems,” he said. “And science itself will have been bought by war on the installment plan.”
Today, no educational institution more symbolizes the magnitude of that moral corruption than the University of California. The UC system avidly continues to provide key management functions - serving as a prestigious air-freshener for the stench of annihilation technology - at the Livermore and Los Alamos nuclear weapons laboratories.
In the first years of the 21st century, a liberal script has hailed science as an urgent antidote to the irrationality of the Bush administration.
Such faith in science may be logical, but it is also ironic and ultimately unpersuasive. Pure allegiance to scientific truth has existed least of all in political domains, where pivotal findings are routinely filtered by power, self-interest and ideology.
For instance, the technical and ecological advantages of mass transit have long been clear; yet foremost engineering minds are deployed to the task of building better SUVs. And there has never been any question that nuclear weapons are bad for the Earth and the human future, but no one ever condemns the continuing development of nuclear weapons as a bipartisan assault on science. On the contrary, America’s nonstop R&D efforts for thermonuclear weapons are all about science.
The Republican assault on science is cause for alarm when applied to the matter of global warming. But carrying a liberal torch for “science,” currently in fervent vogue, leaves unchallenged the across-the-aisle embrace of scientific pursuits in the weaponry field that have never been benign. When it comes to designing and manufacturing the latest devices of mass destruction, only the most rigorous science need apply.
In practice, the value of science remains self-evident and ambiguous. Science is impartial because its discoveries are verifiable and accurate - but science is also, through funding and government direction, largely held captive. Its massively destructive capabilities are often seen as stupendous assets. In the case of ultramodern American armaments, the worse they get, the better they get.
Fifty years after Sputnik, the American love affair with cutting-edge technology has never been more torrid. Everyday digital achievements are so fantastic that they fill our horizons and often seem to define our futures. The emphasis on speed, convenience and technical capacity keeps us fixated on the latest new frontiers. But technology cannot help with the most distinctly human and vital of endeavors - deciding what we truly care about most.
Norman Solomon’s new book “Made Love, Got War: Close Encounters with America’s Warfare State” has just come off the press. For more information, go to: www.MadeLoveGotWar.com. The documentary film “War Made Easy: How Presidents and Pundits Keep Spinning Us to Death” is based on Norman Solomon’s book of the same title. For information about the full-length movie, narrated by Sean Penn and produced by the Media Education Foundation, go to: www.WarMadeEasyTheMovie.org
© 2007 San Francisco Chronicle
Embrace the technology that is now being used to marginalize you? Bill Joy (Sun Microsystems) argued similarly as Ted Kaczynski did, about GNR (genetic engineering, nanotechnology and robotics.) We’ve seen the malovolence of this administration, and how the system reduces people to the status of domestic animals. Americans, delusionally, believe they don’t have a choice when they are led by extreme individuals. Alternatively, placing malevolent authority on the scrap heap of history should be 50% as likely.
And when it comes to technology, instead of the latest and most complex “whiz-bang”, why don’t we start implementing something much more appropriate:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Appropriate_technology
Peace,
Ken Hausle
In a country that was founded on and credited with VIOLENCE, AGRESSION, and the URGE TO BELITTLE OTHERS WHEN IT CAN’T WIN HONESTLY, it is no coincidence that this country continues to use SCIENCE FOR VIOLENCE. Thank you Norman Solomon for pointing out the “conservative” hypocrisy when it comes to science.
“Yet the dominant American responses to Sputnik had enduring impacts that propelled a “scientific-technological elite” to new heights of power.” To some extent this is true, but to a great extent the opposite is true. The size of the engineering and science field expanded greatly, but the power (and relative wealth) of the individual engineer or scientist has diminished.
While high-tech guided missiles were used in Vietnam, the bombing itself tended to be quite low tech overall, as the number of precision guided munitions used was low compared to the overall tonnage of bombs used. There is a well known story (in the PGM business) of a bridge in North Vietnam that survived multiple attacks with dumb bombs, I believe with the loss of several bombers. It was finally taken out with a guided bomb. I later heard an addition to that story. The video, taken by the bomb’s TV camera and uploaded to the launch aircraft, was apparently shown to many in the Navy. A former Navy man told me he saw the video: it didn’t just hit the bridge, it hit an old man on a bicycle.
Ironically, now we have a situation in which non-military jobs in science and engineering are being exported, leaving the military (and spy) markets with a greater share of the remaining jobs.
“When scientific power outruns moral power, we end up with guided missiles and misguided men.”
**Great quote.
Remember that Sputnik’s ancestor was the sending up of farm animals in a hot air balloon–and that Sputnik 2 doomed a dog to a lonely terrified death in space. There has always been a moral perversion in science–dating back to Rene Descartes.
Science is religion. This is why it isnt questioned.
Heroin and Cocaine started out as over the counter medicines–we dont hear much about that now.
The moral foundation of vivisection is that it is ok to torture and kill one to help another–kicking a family out of their house to help a vagrant.
These attitudes arent questioned–the development of new diseases in labs. The fact that the Manhatten Project scientists took bets to see if the atmosphere would ignite in the first nuke test.
They used to burn witches for allegedly spoiling harvests and livestock. Isnt that what Monsanto does today?
Dr. Frankenstein tried to create a new form of life. The result was a pathetic monster that had no place in the world of humans. The confused and betrayed scientific creation then kills the innocent, himself and his maker.
Presently our nation is being looted by a “Strangelove” military industrial congressional science complex designed to give capitalist criminals global dominance. This militaristic freak show is advertised as a way to a safer world but only knows how to destroy.
And what is the cost for this exotic and expensive killing technology linked to the pathology of American capitalism ?
They have already wasted more money attacking Afghanistan and Iraq than the energy resources are worth. And the PNAC plan, which now seems to be policy for both political parties, is to occupy the Middle East and Central Asia for the rest of the 21st century.
But, the dollars and sense of the situation point to both economic and moral bankruptcy. As most empires have learned, guerilla wars of attrition are never profitable while creating new problems and more enemies.
With over 55,000 cowardly high-tech bombing sorties over poverty-stricken Afghanistan their resistance fighters continue to make gains on the ground. Fallujuh is a bombed-out ghost town but has become an Iraqi symbol of a resistance that will go on forever.
But this may be a tough American nut to crack.
The warmongers are making money from their war crimes, win or loose, and the conflict has also raised the price of their favorite commodity, oil.
And surprise, the White House is full of oil and “defense” players and Congress feeds off bribes from both industries. It would be nice to know who in Washington has investments in the death and global warming corporate empire.
While this dilemma has become a win win for the sociopaths it is a lose lose for the taxpayer and consumer in what may be the largest transfer of public wealth into private hands in history.
The social and moral cost is a bit more difficult to calculate along with the
value of a million Iraqi lives ?
With every death, the world is changed.
It’s “flat earth” all over again, only in this epoch, it’s the thrall to a belief in god as omnipotent male, creation as His ejaculatory big bang that gives rise to this unconscious “let’s play god” big bang (weapons investment) simulation ad nauseum.
Science is part of the human experience, that which extends from the cold logical portion of our brain, or if readers prefer, our conditioned mental apparatus. SOLOMON adds, “In contrast, a lot of the emerging counterculture had to do with efforts to open doors of perception.” As a child of the 60’s I am so grateful that I got to participate in–and come of age–during this breath of spiritual fresh air, this small bubble wherein another Renaissance as potential seed was planted.
KELMER: You definitely nailed Monsanto’s moral bottom line. Any company that made blood profits from Agent Orange, and never paid a price, only to go on designing the latest generation of poisons to air bomb on agrarian populations (South America) is not the one I want to design my cereal, seed crops or future genes. Atlantis is falling all over again.
J CONRAD: Important points! Gracias.
Well, Sputnik scared hell out of the US government, that’s for sure!
And, probably ended up with our fake moon landing –
JFK probably thought we could go to the moon . .. .
but the evidence was building — from satellites returning, for instance, that radiation would keep us earthbound.
Or — at least in near outer space.
Manned-exploration is doomed by the Van Allen Belts –
Unmanned space travel is the way to go.
You might also notice that we have fake evidence on Star Wars success –
Here is an excellent one hour documentary about the history of the US space program:
Aresenal of Hypocrisy
http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-4835966027154828456
International Week of Protest to Stop the Militarization of Space: October 4-13, 2007.
Sponsors:
Global Network Against Weapons & Nuclear Power in Space http://www.space4peace.org
Women’s Int’l League for Peace & Freedom http://www.wilpf.org
America may have lost every high-profile war it has launched since Korea, but what it has won every time is a renewed lease on life for its war industries. While its pathetic anti-war movement bleats about bringing the troops home — as if the return of this particular batch of GI’s is gonna change anything in the larger scheme of things — investors with holdings in the Perpetual War Portfolio …
http://www.rationalenquirer.org/features/portfolio/
…have increased their wealth by 112.9 percent since 9/11. How do these profits stack up against a few ragged-assed troops in Iraq and Afghanistan?
Wise up, American anti-war activists. Your precious troops are already dead.
The troops are not dead, but “america” may be.
Bring the troops home now. Bring them home.
Peace,
Ken Hausle
Oh boy. The anti-war activists need serious lessons in framing the debates and sticking to ideas. Back in Vietnam, the anti-war protesting was never enough to bring the troops home and by the time they came home, the DAMAGE was already done. As maxpayne correctly pointed out, America’s love of violence from its inception has put this country through so many wars and unnecessary bloodshed. From baby cartoons to adult shows, the concept of violence for “fun” is installed in the mind of us Americans. Until we band together and take down everything that harbours violence and terrorism, we’re all going to be full time LOSERS.
Frederick Johnson,
Spartanburg, SC
I almost always learn something important when I read Norman Solomon. There’s a problem with this one, I think. Ever since Archimedes and the early Chinese, science has been wedded to weapons. Sputnik wasn’t anything new, I’m afraid.
Zoya: Thanks for the rationalenquirer website.
http://www.rationalenquirer.org/features/portfolio/
I would think connections drawn on that site are just the tip of the iceberg in terms of the overall web of corruption. The listed industries are only a few of many war-related corporations feeding on public money. It is interesting that Alliant shows up as big contractor as they create DU weapons.
The following is an outrageous read on depleted uranium weapons as linked to current warfare and the Bush Carlyle Group and the Livermore lab, etc.
http://www.mindfully.org/Nucs/2004/DU-Trojan-Horse1jul04.htm
More connections are explored in the following:
http://www.fredsakademiet.dk/library/du.htm
And here are Carlyle ties to nuclear weapons research and the potential for depleted uranium as a tool of genocide in oil-rich regions.
http://www.mindfully.org/Nucs/2004/Moret-Nuclear-Carlyle16sep04.htm
And if this is not enough, we now have the incestuous growth of mercenary armies. If something isn’t done to shut that mutant industry down, we will have more and more military people retiring in their forties and starting up private war corporations via their established career connections.
However, the question remains just how much longer they can continue to loot a federal treasury that is already empty ?
The Iraq/Afghan American war crimes are being run on borrowed money. We are already seeing creeping inflation and only part of the war has been paid for with more expense down the road, such as caring for the disabled, replacing equipment and interest on the debt.
Any sharp economic thinkers out there ? Can deficit military spending go on forever ? Economic history seems to say that militaristic empires are eventually drained by over-reach and war like the collapse of the British empire ?
JContrad writes: “Any sharp economic thinkers out there ? Can deficit military spending go on forever ? Economic history seems to say that militaristic empires are eventually drained by over-reach and war like the collapse of the British empire?”
I’m no economist, but my research does suggest that it’s ultimately economics that brings empires down: the British were flat broke after WWII, and by 1950 the Empire had become merely “the Commonwealth.”
A good book in the present context is Chalmers Johnson’s *Nemesis*. Another good one is Emmanuel Todd’s *After the Empire: The Breakdown of the American Order*. Todd is the guy who predicted the collapse of the Soviet empire back in 1973. Everyone thought he was just a crackpot, but everything unfolded just as he said. Indeed, the Soviets collapsed by trying to outspend the US in terms of military hardware and wetware (shoulda listened to Marx: there’s no room in a communist state for a military).
Another fair analysis (though incomplete) is “The Rise And Fall Of The Great Powers” by Paul Kennedy, 1987. In that work Kennedy ponders the possible demise of the U.S.
“They have already wasted more money attacking Afghanistan and Iraq than the energy resources are worth.”
I’d appreciate a source for this. Thanks in advance.
“Can deficit military spending go on forever ?”
Military spending is ostensibly an investment in the security of a nation. To the extent that the realized security enhances a growing economy, it could theoretically happen, depending on the amount of the deficit/debt and the growth rate.
OTOH, war itself is destructive to an economy, even though it’s true that it would benefit certain industries.
There has always been and always will be such a “marriage,” as long as mankind remains the way it is. Albert Einstein knew this well.
I majored in physics until I dropped out of college due to depression. I had a strong intrinsic interest in understanding how the physical world( the only world some would say ) worked. But I would have ended up working for the MI-complex either directly or indirectly. Society in general doesn’t give a damn about pure science or the wonders of knowledge. People only want to know, “What good is it?” i.e. “How does it meet my own narcissistic needs?” Human civilization isn’t mature enough to handle the empowerments of science. Noam Chomsky is right when he asserts that we probably won’t survive the 21st century.
SPUTNIK goes around the world and when in Mexico, the Mexican Security Police allow the Americans to “see” it secretly, and the next thing you know, the U.S. is ahead in the space race. Or at least that is a story told to me by someone who claimed to have been there. To strengthen the claim, it was also said that Pres. Kennedy officially thanked the Mexican Government for their “help.” (quotes mine)
Deficit miltary spending can go on as long as there are lenders and a gullible electorate. Meanwhile, the non-military infrastructure will continue to crumble (Twin Cities bridge is just a harbinger…stay tuned for MUCH more), the US dollar will continue spiraling downward, and the US standard of living will be third world quality (meaning that the top 3% will live better with each passing year, the other 97% will live worse with each passing year).
Jaketown:
No one is an absolute expert on economic theory, but there are some no-brainer aspects on the continued occupation of Iraq. Be your own judge. I did some reading and wrote the following, which also addresses your thought, “Military spending is ostensibly an investment in the security of a nation.”
http://www.commondreams.org/archive/2007/07/31/2886/
Now, that was a general essay, as I am a generalist being an ex-teacher and English major. But even the so-called experts in their fields will disagree as they usually have an agenda or belong to a political think group of some kind and are opinion for hire.
Before you judge my essay, give a read to Chalmer’s Johnson (ex-CIA analyst) publications, “Blowback, “The Sorrows Of Empire” and “Nemesis”. Then add in “After The Empire” by Todd, who called the economic implosion of Russia when no one else could see it coming. Balance this out with some Howard Zinn American history to map the imperialistic patterns that began with Columbus. And then there is Chomsky who is so accurate that he can be dull at times, but is hard to argue with. And don’t forget Arundhati Roy for a vivid view from another civilzation that lived with/under the imperial British for centuries.
But back to the question, “They have already wasted more money attacking Afghanistan and Iraq than the energy resources are worth.” I’d appreciate a source for this. Thanks in advance.”
Again you will have to do your own homework. I used to work in the oil patch and there is no exact science on how much oil might be in the ground in a certain geography.
However, here is a one discussion of the subject in economic terms prior to the invasion.
http://www.globalpolicy.org/security/oil/2002/12heart.htm
Estimates of the dollar value of that oil run from $3-$5 Trillion. But let’s be generous and call it $10 Trillion. And what portion of that is actually clear profit, I can’t say.
Now go back to my essay, which I wrote before I was aware of the opinion of Pulitzer prize economist Stiglitz (Harvard no less) who puts the cost to date at $2 Trillion. And of course, this does not include the “normal” estimated cost of a military presence in the Middle East with figure like $70 Billion. And then there is foreign aid to oppressive regimes like Egypt and Israel and Jordan..etc. Many of our nasty allies in the region have made us one of the most resented nations on earth.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/Iraq/Story/0,2763,1681119,00.html
And since the Iraqis have established an effective resistance movement that will require a perpetual occupation, the math is clear. They. The oil and military corporate complex, are spending more than the resources is worth in objective terms. We are essentially subsidizing their profits with our taxes and the lives of our poverty draft soldiers. The career generals are usually part of the class of economic parasites feeding on the system.
Now there is a much less clear field of thought that you have touched on with somewhat militaristic language. “Military spending is ostensibly an investment in the security of a nation.”
Chalmers Johnson predicted 9/11 in “Blowback”. The book was ignored and then the Saudis crashed planes into the towers. And at what cost. The economic fallout could be in the trillions. The quality of life aspect is harder to measure. And if you want to ask why, just go to the 90’s interview with Bin Laden on why they are pissed at America. IT IS OUR FOREIGN POLICY. They do not hate our “freedoms”. Bin Laden outlined what is held as valid by nearly everyone in the Middle East other than the Israeli conservatives (google AIPAC and PNAC)who encouraged our invasion of Iraq. Primary issues for Osama were, American troops in Saudi Arabia, the oppression of Palestinians, the sanctions on Iraq, and in general a century of imperialistic oil political meddling by Europeans and Americans in Muslim/Arab affairs.
Interview: http://www.anusha.com/osamaint.htm
Osama is also reported to have said that in this guerrilla war of attrition America will spend a $Million for every dollar the “resistance movement” spends. Osama is not an economic fool, but from a well-eduacted money family.
For an early read on this hisotorical trend try Lawrence and “The Seven Pillars Of Wisdom”.
And don’t forget that both Osama and Saddam were the direct creations of past covert American foreign policy centered on oil. That is called ” blowback “. Very expensive, but keeps the arms dealer busy.
Does such foreign policy and militarism make us safer ? I am suggesting that we are making more problems rather than less. Some say the American empire is in decline, although I suspect like the fall of the British empire, that the economic elite will manage to escape their crimes and roll their money over into new global schemes while the rest of us pick up the long term “cost”.
There is also the very gray area of the value of the dollar. Since Nixon took us off the gold standard to pay for Nam deficit spending, we have had a floating currency. This has become something of a confidence game. World opinion is looking at us now as a system out of balance which is why the dollar is dropping. What is the current cost of a devalued currency ? I would expect that answer to be in the $Trillions.
Got to run now, this was a quickie and may be flawed. But give all those sources a read and then get back to me. I would strongly suggest a study of the very real General Eisenhower on the military complex and the old hero and true patriot, General Smedley Butler, who at the end of this career said,
from:
http://rationalrevolution.net/war/major_general_smedley_butler_usm.htm
“ It may seem odd for me, a military man to adopt such a comparison. Truthfulness compels me to. I spent thirty- three years and four months in active military service as a member of this country’s most agile military force, the Marine Corps. I served in all commissioned ranks from Second Lieutenant to Major-General. And during that period, I spent most of my time being a high class muscle- man for Big Business, for Wall Street and for the Bankers. In short, I was a racketeer, a gangster for capitalism.”
” “Military spending is ostensibly an investment in the security of a nation.” This sounds like military propaganda or at the least the argument of an apologist trying to explain how the military corporate congressional oil complex got out of control.”
I mentioned nothing of any particular conflict. Whether a particular conflict or way of spending money is worthwhile is open to debate and quite separate from the merits of my statement.
You are “projecting” I think.
JConrad: I appreciate what it takes to put so much in a post. Thank you.
gde: Thanks, there a few typos but I think the thoughts are in order.
After I posted the above information, I recalled an old true story.
I had an uncle who started out in the oil patch of Oklahoma as a roughneck progressed all the way to oilfield equipment and “supplies” and ended up with his own supply business in Saudi Arabia.
I was visiting him outside London in 1969 at his mansion. Over a lot of Irish whisky he finally explained the secret of his success.
” Ya know, the real money in the Middle East is in weapons, not oil “.
My good boy ole’ uncle had branched out into the arms trade in some way or another. His statement was factual. The inter-connected arms trade revolving around the Middle East is bigger business than the oil itself. This began way back in the early 20th century when Rockefeller began to exploit Saudi oil.
9/11 could be seen as “blowback” with resentful Saudis crashing into the American center of global capitalism and the pentagon center of corporate military muscle! And our response has been to escalate the type of militarism that led to the crisis.
Of course this is assuming that 9/11 was not an American “black box” operation creating an excuse to invade Afghanistan and Iraq. At the least, evidence indicates that 9/11 could have been prevented.
And when you review the “costs” involved in the Iraq crimes and other aggression, keep in mind we get only about 20 percent of our imported oil from the Middle East. Energy conservation and alternative energy development alone could make up for that.
And imagine how much oil we could buy on the open market rather than by force with $2 Trillion, But then that would by-pass the military industrial money schemes.
What the PNAC/Big Oil crowd wants is hegemony over the Middle East and Central Asia and they are willing to spend any amount of our tax money and or kill millions of people if necessary to subsidize their criminal capitalism.
As long as we are subsidizing the oil industry, taxpayers should get gas at subsidized prices. In Venezuela where the oil industry is nationalized, gas goes for about 25 cents a gallon, although I have not checked that price lately.
” In Venezuela where the oil industry is nationalized, gas goes for about 25 cents a gallon, although I have not checked that price lately.”
And that works out because the government deprives it’s people of the proceeds that that commodity would otherwise get in the world market. I guess that’s good if you drive a car, especially if you drive a lot. Is that subsidy supported by the people I wonder? $80 a barrel they could have instead.
jakenewton:
After writing opinion items for about 30 years I have a general policy of not responding to hecklers who take cheap shots by taking once sentence out of context and twisting the meaning.
“I mentioned nothing of any particular conflict.”
Gimme a break as they say. Your military theory was expressed in direct response to my discussion of the Iraq conflict and then you deny that your response had anything to do with the Iraq situation.
“Ostensibly” you sound like an apologist for the oil and military industries stalking chat rooms with pithy W.F. Buckley comments rather than contributing original writing or thought.
For review, written by JConrad:
“Any sharp economic thinkers out there ? Can deficit military spending go on forever ? Economic history seems to say that militaristic empires are eventually drained by over-reach and war like the collapse of the British empire ?”
Looks to me like JConrad specifically detoured from a discussion of the war with Iraq to a much more general context. No attention particular country or conflict seems to be required in this detour. It’s all ther for everyone to see.
My response:
“Military spending is ostensibly an investment in the security of a nation. To the extent that the realized security enhances a growing economy, it could theoretically happen, depending on the amount of the deficit/debt and the growth rate.”
Was equally general in nature and loaded with caveats. Yet JConrad jumps to conclusions about my motives or some other thing, leaving the suggested “theory”, which was not even strongly avered by on my part, quite untouched. All in public for everyone to see.
JConrad, why not respond to the substance of what I wrote, which may actually be wrong, instead of making irrelevent claims about who or what you think I am? You should know better with your thirty years experience after all. It’s called “Ad Hominem” and is to be avoided.
JConrad - Thanks for the anecdote about where a lot of the real money in the oil business is. It paid for my house (weapons design, not oil) in the cold war days. It is after I left it & became a father I learned the primary role of the US military in the cold war was to provoke it, from the WW1 multinational invasion of Siberia to first use of nukes to tactical use doctrine in Europe to MIRVs and Star Wars (outside of an early Soviet lead in ICBMs).
For those inclined to due technical work using the physical sciences & engineering, weapons design and technical spying are still fascinating and well paying work, & less vulnerable to outsourcing than all but menial McJobs.
Jakenewton:
Give it a rest, you are either very confused or are here to spin false information online.
” JConrad, why not respond to the substance of what I wrote ”
Well, one of the few comprehensible but twisted statements you have made is the following on Venezuela:
” And that works out because the government deprives it’s people of the proceeds that that commodity would otherwise get in the world market. I guess that’s good if you drive a car, especially if you drive a lot. Is that subsidy supported by the people I wonder? $80 a barrel they could have instead.”
And you have repeated the same lie about Venezuela commenting on another article digressing from the topic of Burma. Do you have a hidden agenda ?
http://www.commondreams.org/archive/2007/10/08/4393/
” Isn’t gasoline there subsidized, so that the cost to consumers is pennies a gallon? They do that by depriving the people of the price they could get for the oil on the world market. Is that “generosity ”? ”
Spock would be very disappointed in your lack of rational thought.
Venezuela is part of OPEC and sells it’s quota of oil internationally at whatever the global price may be. The proceeds are then used for the benefit of the people of Venezuela for such things a national health care and higher education which are increasingly out of reach for many people here is “developed” America. They also make domestic energy products affordable, since they have a huge surplus, to improve the Venezuelan standard of living.
Our oil corporations pay as little royalty and taxes as possible when they exploit public oil sources, such as BLM lands, USFS lands, and offshore deposits. But then Exxon pays CEO’s $400 million while engaging in global warming disinformation projects. And they are also subsidized with counterproductive wars of aggression.
on Venezuela from:
http://www.zmag.org/content/showarticle.cfm?ItemID=11562
” In 2004, Venezuela invested $3.7-billion of its $6.5-billion net oil profits in social missions. In 2005 this figure increased to nearly $5-billion, providing medical services to over 17 million Venezuelans, teaching one million people to read, and granting 46 per cent of Venezuelans access to basic foodstuffs at significant discounts. Last year, Energy Minister Rafael Ramírez announced the industry’s plans for the period from 2005-2012 based on projected revenues, calling for a total social investment of $56-billion (nearly $10-billion per year).
The social programs are not just creating educational and health programs while the oil money lasts: they are mobilizing the populace. Education and health programs, subsidized basic foods, job training, co-operatives, land reform committees, participatory budgeting initiatives—all are possible because of high oil prices, but their legacy will outlast Venezuela’s oil reserves. This investment is building a society fundamentally inclusive of the 37 per cent of Venezuelans who live in poverty, and the much larger number who live within its shadow—the very people who have historically been the victims of a society designed to perpetuate the rights and privileges of a tiny minority. Those who previously would never have obtained university degrees or even learned to read are now both educated and invested in their own futures. The legacy of democratization will be hard to reverse, no matter what turns are taken by future oil policy or future governments.
In the same way, Venezuela’s solidaristic foreign policy—dubbed “oil diplomacy” by some—is building regional and international capacities. In an immediate sense, it is proving to the world the that there is an alternative to the neo-liberal model, which has billed itself as the only option for the past 25 years. Recently, Venezuela has created regional oil initiatives—including investment, assistance with development, and preferential pricing—for the Caribbean (PetroCaribe), the Andean region (PetroAndino), South America (PetroSur), and Latin America (PetroAmerica), along with a spectacularly successful oil-for-doctors agreement with Cuba, and oil-for-food-and-goods deals with Argentina, Brazil and Uruguay.”
Will the real Jakenewton please stand up ?
However, have a nice day and thanks for giving me the opportunity to post some information on Venezuela.
“Well, one of the few comprehensible but twisted statements you have made is the following on Venezuela”
Why are you changing the subject? Why don’t you address the comments I made about military, security, and the economy in *this* thread? It was in response to *your* question. How ungrateful.
“Do you have a hidden agenda ?”
Another Ad Hominem dismissed. This is a beginner’s error.
“They also make domestic energy products affordable, since they have a huge surplus, to improve the Venezuelan standard of living.”
OK I’ll bite just for fun. Think about how they do that. They provide the raw material seemingly at “no cost” as input to the refinery. But there is opportunity cost, because they are withholding that material from the global market and thus lose the potential proceeds. The lost cash could be used for anything, but the cheap gasoline they give away to the people can only be used as fuel, benefiting only those who drive cars, encourages waste, and wrecks the environment.
I predict you will ignore that analysis, in the same way you ignored my answer to your question.
“Will the real Jakenewton please stand up ?”
That’s rich, which one of us is liberally changing the subject? You ask a question, I politely provide a theoretical answer, which you completely ignore, and then in your ingratitude all you can do is accuse me of having an agenda. This from a guy claiming to have thirty years writing experience. Bizzare.
“However, have a nice day and thanks for giving me the opportunity to post some information on Venezuela”
While completely ignoring your *obligation* to stick to the subject that *you* had brought up to begin with. Have a nice day indeed.
Hmmm ?
Had to do a little checking, but it appears that Chavez has been a force for HIGHER crude prices for the benefit of developing nations and poor Americans.
I can only wonder why Jakenewton is interested in smearing his reputation.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/12/03/AR2006120300388.html
Chavez to Push OPEC for High Oil Prices
The Associated Press
Sunday, December 3, 2006; 2:40 PM
CARACAS, Venezuela — “ President Hugo Chavez will continue pressing the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries to defend high oil prices if he wins a second six-year term on Sunday, Venezuela’s oil minister said.
Over the past eight years Chavez has been one of OPEC’s leading price hawks.
High oil prices have brought a major boost to Venezuela’s economy, as well as to Chavez’s oil-funded social programs for the poor, which range from subsidized grocery stores to cash assistance for single mothers ”.
And discounted heating oil for poor Americans..etc.
http://www.boston.com/news/local/massachusetts/articles/2005/11/20/thousands_in_mass_to_get_cheaper_oil/
http://www.democracynow.org/article.pl?sid=05/09/20/1330218
“I predict you will ignore that analysis, in the same way you ignored my answer to your question.”
That was spot on, Jake, spot on.
JConrad, if you are ready to reenter the conversation we were having, just address the issue at hand. Your purposeful and shameful retreat on a completely irrelevent tangent is noted, and does not save you. Your public embarassment is limited only because the thread has died down.
Hello again Jakenewton. I think we scared the others away. (humor). I think you have misunderstood my attempts at humor as in the Spock comment.
But you asked: “ OK I’ll bite just for fun. Think about how they do that. They provide the raw material seemingly at “no cost” as input to the refinery. But there is opportunity cost, because they are withholding that material from the global market and thus lose the potential proceeds. The lost cash could be used for anything, but the cheap gasoline they give away to the people can only be used as fuel, benefiting only those who drive cars, encourages waste, and wrecks the environment.”
“ I predict you will ignore that analysis, in the same way you ignored my answer to your question.”
I did try to post an answer to your Chavez point as requested last night, but the post was held for “moderation” by CD.
But note, you raised the Venezuela question . You changed the subject, not me, and now you want to change it again back to the Iraq question I have already answered. Old debate technique. I am here to present information and not debate.
I already explained the military, security and economy issues in previous posts. Have you read the Chalmers Johnson trilogy yet ? And “After The Empire” by Todd is mainly economics. Did you read my previous CD essay on the cost of empire ? They are all part of my answer. I spent a lot of time on that post and one reader thanked me for the effort.
And you stated: “But there is opportunity cost, because they are withholding that material from the global market and thus lose the potential proceeds.”
Actually I am not sure whether Chavez is using the profits from selling oil internationally at $80.00 a barrel to subsidizes domestic oil products or whether he sets aside part of their crude production for domestic use. It would make sense to divert some of their crude rather than diverting dollars as international reserve currency.
However this is a moot point.
Chavez sells as much as he can at high international prices and then, and one way or another, makes energy products affordable to the people of Venezuela. If he sold more than his international OPEC quota the global price would drop and it would be a loss to Venezuela. The “ withholding ” is a key to their economic success.
The old colonial model Chavez replaced would be for Venezuela to open their country to the oil multinationals, like we are trying to do in Iraq with force. The people of Venezuela would then purchase gas at $3.00 a gallon from ExxonMobil and watch their money leave Venezuela.
There is no “lost cash” in the Chavez situation, but a chance for the average person to SAVE money by keep their money within Venezuela. The Venezuelans who save on energy costs use the savings for other aspects of life. Farmers can afford to run their tractors and grow food. Win win for the common man.
You stated: “ And that works out because the government deprives it’s people of the proceeds that that commodity would otherwise get in the world market.”
It is neither true nor fair to claim that this process “deprives” the people of Venezuela of the value of that resource and that their government is lacking in “generosity”.
Their democratic government is arguably the most generous and creative oil-funded government on earth.
Chavez is working internationally as well as domestically in very innovative ways so that Venezuela’s oil resources benefit as many people as possible and is helping nations less fortunate than Venezuela. Check out the complete Zmag article on Chavez’s economic methods as well as the posted excerpt.
The following is also a relevant read as Chavez also engages in barter with oil since the dollar is not doing well these days. Example: “Meanwhile Hugo Chavez has been taking Venezuelan oil out of the petrodollar economy by bartering oil directly for commodities from thirteen other third world countries.”
Oil is more or less money these days and there are more ways than one to share the wealth.
http://socrates.berkeley.edu/~pdscott/iraq.html
And actually, the Chavez issues tie directly to my original thoughts on the Iraq war crimes as that misguided aggression is classic militaristic imperialism that has become counterproductive. International cooperation is the future.
End of my story as we are using up CD space.
“But note, you raised the Venezuela question . You changed the subject, not me, “
Demonstrably untrue. *You* posted this in the 27th post:
“As long as we are subsidizing the oil industry, taxpayers should get gas at subsidized prices. In Venezuela where the oil industry is nationalized, gas goes for about 25 cents a gallon, although I have not checked that price lately.”
That’s the first occurrence of the word “Venezuela” in the thread. I responded to that in the 28th post.
“I already explained the military, security and economy issues in previous posts.”
“Did you read my previous CD essay on the cost of empire ?”
I did, and I did not see where it addressed my theoretical points directly or indirectly. And did you not write this ad hominem in response:
” This sounds like military propaganda or at the least the argument of an apologist trying to explain how the military corporate congressional oil complex got out of control.”
“Have you read the Chalmers Johnson trilogy yet ? And “After The Empire” by Todd is mainly economics. “
These are books? Um, no, not since you first suggested them just a couple days ago.
“Actually I am not sure whether Chavez is using the profits from selling oil internationally at $80.00 a barrel to subsidizes domestic oil products or whether he sets aside part of their crude production for domestic use. “
It makes no difference. One way or the other, cash proceeds from sales of crude or manufactured product on world markets where normal supply and demand laws prevail are lost.
“It would make sense to divert some of their crude rather than diverting dollars as international reserve currency. “
While it is true that this is a common practice in many countries with oil production surplus, whether it is wise or not is debatable. I merely raised the point, without stating outright that it was unwise, and I was accused of smearing Chavez for it.
“There is no “lost cash” in the Chavez situation, “
On the contrary, the cash is lost. It is demonstrably, relentlessly true. Brush up on Opportunity Cost. The only issue is whether the loss is more than balanced by a gain, and that is open to debate.
“ The Venezuelans who save on energy costs use the savings for other aspects of life. Farmers can afford to run their tractors and grow food. “
True enough, in fact oil consumption levels are often a proxy for GDP rates within a country and over some limited time frame. But you have to ask if abundant cheap energy encourages or discourages efficient use of that energy. How much GDP does Venezuela produce per barrel of oil they consume? More or less than the US or other nations? Wikipedia shows the US at almost three times the efficiency of Venezuela:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gross_domestic_product_per_barrel
Many European nations quite a bit more still.
“Their democratic government is arguably the most generous and creative oil-funded government on earth”
I am loath to accept that any government can be generous, believing the trait to be the province of individuals. But I would be very interested in knowing how popular the various programs of internal and external “generosity” are with the Venezuelans.
Economics is tricky stuff even for the experts. As Alan Greenspan once said, “I don’t pretend to know all the answers.”
My initial information on Chavez and thier oil policy came from the Venezuelan wife of my nephew. She said Hugo is loved and admired by most Venezuelans and throughout Central and South America for his progressive populist policies, and of course for standing up to the neo-liberals and neocons and assorted corporate criminals.
And in my previous post I mentioned my own essay of opinion on our blundering and bloated military complex that is supposed to be expanding the American empire and making us safer.
http://www.commondreams.org/archive/2007/07/31/2886/
And from my post, Chalmers Johnson is ex-CIA and wrote a series of three books, Blowback, The Sorrows of Empire, and Nemesis, all of which cover what he sees as an over-extended phony empire that has become destructive and counterproductive.
This fits very well into Solomon’s wisdom on the insanity of high-tech weapons when, for example, we can’t even control the ground after bombing our way into Afghanistan and Iraq. And of course there is also the morality of war crimes.
Todd (”After The Empire”) is similar to Johnson but is more into economics and demography and thinks our “empire” is bankrupt but appears to be alive for the moment.
Another twist in the Iraq/Afghan mess is that while the Babylon System is tied down there, South America is more free to engage in their own liberation. Jah Rastifari !
Another serious military/corporate bankrupt empire critic is Walden Bello in “Dilemmas Of Domination.”
Time will tell.
Peace !
Opps, a tired typo. That is Rastafari !
And on Babylon systems, here is the author of Bush In Babylon discussing the occupation of Iraq and the importance of Chavez.
http://www.commondreams.org/scriptfiles/views03/1213-05.htm
http://www.counterpunch.org/tariq08162004.html
and a few Chavez quotes:
“ Capitalism is savagery.
Before, education was privatized. That’s the neo-liberal, imperialist plan, health systems were privatized, that cannot be, it’s a fundamental human right. Health, education, water, energy, public services, that cannot be given to the voracity of private capital, that denies those rights to the people, that’s the road to savagery, capitalism is savagery.
But the Venezuelan people demonstrated to the oligarchy that they will never surrender.
We resisted, we defended ourselves, and then went on the counteroffensive. As a result in 2003, for the first time, Venezuela recuperated its oil company, which had always been in the hands of the Venezuelan oligarchy and the North American Empire.
Empires have always been brutal, there are no good or bad Empires, they are all aberrant, brutal, perverse, no matter what they wear or how they speak.
Empires sometimes do not get surrounded, they rot from inside, and then they tumble down and get destroyed as the Roman Empire and every Empire from Europe in the past centuries. Some day the rottenness that it carries inside will end up destroying the US Empire.”
“Economics is tricky stuff even for the experts. As Alan Greenspan once said, “I don’t pretend to know all the answers.””
Right. Truman was said to have asked for a one handed economist to avoid the “on the other hand” caveat.