Subscribe to Common Dreams News Updates
Most Popular This Week
Popular content
Today's Top News
How Much is Enough?
Once upon a time, people researched and wrote reports about lower defense spending and converting the military-industrial complex into a peacetime economy. These reports came from university research institutions, private think tanks, and the federal government. They are memorials to the hope kindled in the brief post-Cold War and pre-War on Terrorism moment when anything seemed possible. Even cutting the military budget was not unthinkable because we had pulled the planet back from the brink and survived five decades on the edge of nuclear midnight. Scholarship turned itself to the work of dismantling the war machine in such a way that no one -- no machinist turning bolts on bombs or aircraft engineer with his polished plans -- was crushed in the process.These reports read not just like they are 15 years old. They read like dispatches from a remote and almost unimaginable planet.
Converting the Cold War Economy, published in 1993 by the Economic Policy Institute, began with the premise that President George H. W. Bush's $281 billion budgets could be halved over the next decade. The report proposed even bolder actions: "Deeper cuts resulting in budgets as low as $67 billion a year are conceivable if the U.S. were to defer preparations for unilateral action in favor of a cooperative approach to security based at the United Nations and if arms sales by the major industrialized countries to the Third World were stopped."
What a difference 15 years makes! The Pentagon lost $13 billion alone in the sofa cracks last year. The Government Accountability Office put the price of Pentagon accounting problems at $13 billion in 2005.
For fiscal year 2008, we are looking at a "base military budget" of $520 billion and another $127.5 billion in war spending, which means that total military spending will hit $647.5 billion. The Bush administration has presided over one of the largest military buildups in the history of the United States. $647 billion is a lot of money. After adjusting for inflation, it represents the highest level of military spending since World War II.
Following the Money
Why are we spending so much? In large part, it is because of the many Cold War systems that have managed to stay in the budget and in the Pentagon's "toolbox" despite having no relevance, no rival, or no hope of ever delivering what they promise. One of the best examples of all three of these categories is ballistic missile defense -- a problematic, unjustifiable and immensely expensive military programs. Since concept development in 1983, the United States has spent close to $100 billion dollars on various version of the program. In tests, the system has failed in five out of 11 tests since 2004. This rate was so abysmal that the Missile Defense Agency stopped releasing the results of system and component tests.
The U.S. military budget has never been bigger and our propensity toward militarized solutions from immigration and totalitarianism to terrorism and nuclear proliferation has never been stronger. To speak of cutting the military budget, reallocating resources to support a broader range of security tools, converting away from military-dependent production is a tough task right now. But it is necessary. The military-fits-all solution is failing to deliver on a single promise. We are not safer. "They" are not freer. And we are more hated abroad than ever before!
Oxfam recently published "Africa's Missing Billion: International Arms Flows and the Costs of Conflict," which estimates the economic cost of armed conflict to Africa's development at about $300 billion since 1990. This sum, says Oxfam, is the equivalent of all the international aid from major donors during the same period. The money lost to war and weapons, asserts Oxfam, could have helped develop new approaches to the HIV/AIDS pandemic, cured malaria and tuberculosis, and addressed Africa's need for education, clean water and adequate sanitation. The Losses at Home
The report demonstrates that it is possible to quantify the economic potential lost to wars. Here, we, too, can measure what we lose with a half trillion military "base budget" and many hundred billions more spent waging war in Iraq, Afghanistan and elsewhere. It is visible in every panhandler and soup-line, in overcrowded classrooms and dwindling health-care budgets, in each hard choice that is made in U.S. cities, towns, and rural areas.
It is also visible in our crumbling infrastructure. The Report Card for America's Infrastructure from the America Society of Civil Engineers (ASCE) assessed the physical state of aviation, bridges, dams, drinking water, the national power grid, hazardous waste, navigable waterways, public parks and recreation sites, the rail lines, the roads, schools, security, solid waste, transit, and wastewater throughout the United States and gave the American infrastructure a grade point average of D (poor). The ASCE estimated that it would take $1.6 trillion in investment over five years to repair and restore this infrastructure.
How can we be a secure nation when bridges collapse, water mains explode, and the power grid fails? In each of these recent three instances, the first thought was terrorism. But gravity, neglect, and overuse were the only three active members of the cell that brought down the bridge in Minneapolis, Minnesota in August 2007.
Where will the money come from to rebuild American infrastructure? Who will do the work? These are hopeful questions that can be answered with visionary and practical economic and social policy decisions in Washington. Not asking the questions means continuing to lose out in our economic, human, and national security.
FPIF columnist Frida Berrigan is a senior program associate at the Arms and Security Project of the New America Foundation.
Copyright © 2007, Institute for Policy Studies
59 Comments so far
Show AllBefore America's infrastructure is rebuilt we have to rebuild our political system. It needs to be given back to the people it belongs to. It's obvious that the politicians can't run the country, and corporate influence only further destroys our country. Uncle Sam has been bought out by Uncle Buck and we're all paying for it.
Hoa binh
I would imagine the thinking goes like this:
Q: Where will the money come from to rebuild American infrastructure?
A: Mostly from American exploitation of Iraqi oil reserves (~$28,000,000,000,000 and no sharing) and, after "regime change" in Iran, restored influence over OPEC.
Q: Who will do the work?
A: Halliburton, Bechtel, CH2M Hill, Blackwater, Lockheed Martin, Northrop Gruman, GE, Raytheon, etc.
Welcome to the Ownership Society, suckers.
There are two things that have to happen to kill the military monster. Military age people have to stop volunteering and if a draft is instituted, they have to resist it unanimously. Secondly, everyone has to stop working for "defense" contractors and find an honorable livelihood instead. The beast will die only when people quit working for it. Until then, expect larger military budgets every year. They have the perfect excuse to expand forever - an amorphous enemy that can never be defeated because it has no headquarters. What a deal!
Where will the money come from to rebuild America's infrastructure? Well, if you elect Democrats, lots of them, it will come from raising taxes on both corporations and high-end earners, especially high-end capital gains (which is, by the way, "where the money is", as noted by famous bankrobber, Willie Sutton, when they asked him why he robbed banks.)
If we elect Republicans, infrastucture will increasingly be privatized, and you, the not-so-rich voter who despised those tax-and-spend-for-public-works Dems will pay via "user fees" for every infrastructure thing you touch.
"What a difference 15 years makes!" I wouldn't put my name on this would you?
Pablonium,
You're right on the second point: the large MIC-crowd will be at the trough, rooting for more slop (tax dollars).
But as to the US benefiting from Iraqi oil? Not so much. Its really a long term play (think 10-15 years). Through the first 8 months of this year, about 2.3% of our total oil usage came from Iraq (that's about 4% of the import total). They ar our 7th largest provider of oil; behind Canada, Mexico, Saudi Arabia, Venezuela, Nigeria and Angola. Data here: http://tonto.eia.doe.gov/dnav/pet/pet_move_impcus_a2_nus_ep00_im0_mbblpd_m.htm
Most importantly, we are not getting any kind of a discount on that oil. Its more or less market rates; we're not getting it at half price for example. Long term, Exxon and ilk will have a gusher (pun intended) of profits on the difference. Hell, since 2002 we don't even charge oil companies the 11% royalty they usually paid for pumping oil out of US-owned lands. W's big wet kiss to his home-boys.
So much for the average US consumer getting anything out of Iraqi oil. Add int the military burden tax-wise and you could say we're getting it coming and going.
wars should be abolished.
against nuclear proliferation first step.
nurturers of death no more.
cheney 'really'
the protector of 'american lives'?
obvia-ment not.
The fact that the end of of the Cold War not only didn't produce a peacetime dividend, but instead led to a dramatic (and very bipartisan - Mr. David) redoubling of the MIC war machine effort demonstrates one clear fact - the US was 100% responsible for the cold war from the onset - August 6, 1945.
"Communist threat" my ass.
Goddamn the USA!
A "secure nation" would be a nation that could not be exploited by the MIMC (Military Industrial Media Complex).
The Republican Party is 100% dependent upon boogeyman politics to govern. As soon as one boogeyman no longer scares the electorate, new boogeymen need to be created.
Did you notice that once Dubya said that there was no need to capture Osama Bin Laden, they had to create the next boogeyman...illegal immigrants, and quickly build detention centers for them and future boogeymen. Until the US electorate quits falling for the latest boogeymen scare, the MIMC will have an endless revenue stream at the expense of the US taxpayer and the US Dollar.
Why are we spending so much?
Our military spending continues to "spiral out of control" because the Demok party slammed rightward into the Repuk party in a controlled physics experiment and they "fused together" into one FASCIST PARTY.
Back around 1991 I was watching a TV segment of George Bush Sr. This was just as the USSR was dissolving. There was a lot of talk about a "peace bonus". Bush's proclaimation was this - the new enemy, the real threat, was international terrorists. I thought to myself, ahh .. the con is on.
It is still on, until we get aggressive enough to take back our country from the military-industrial complex, which has owned it since WWII. Its good to see people getting pis*ed off, now do something concrete. Let's not stop halfway. I would like to see an aggressive public airing of all the dirt including the engineered or assisted coups, invasions, rebellions and stolen elections in Chile, Nicaragua, El Salvador, Guatemala, Dominican Republic, Cuba, Argentina, Greece, East Timor, Indonesia, Iran to name a few. The total deaths that can be charged to the US are well up into the millions. If you are shocked by my words, simply do a little reading and then decide for yourselves.
I suspect this will continue until we stop it, politicians aren't going to help, they'll continue to be whores & thieves. It is up to us.
"visionary and practical economic and social policy decisions in Washington"
If we are to wait for something visionary and practical to come out of Washington - there is no hope.
Preznit are you saying that international terrorists are a con? They don't exist? Then I ask you, who blew up the USS Cole? Who blew up our two African embassies? Who flew planes into the World Trade Center? Because, I'd really like to know.
All that money spent on weapons and military, represents the blow out from the lack of constraints to prevent a blowout of consumer society. The sins are Population and over-consumption. We wouldn't need the doomsday military, if our societies had paid attention (with money and actions) to the limits of economic growth and consumption. Now we are going to fight to maintain the unsustainable, and die for the continued madness of lust and gluttony. Post oil peak, who needs all those roads, bridges and multi-over passes? Only the rich will afford vehicles and the necessary armed escorts. Already the nation dissolves into fascism and banditry. The politicians are free riders on top of an irreversible process, who promise to do nothing. The most unscrupulous just hope to arrive first on the top. And that means doing the bidding of the temporary owners of the billions of dollars siphoned ultimately from Gaia, the source of all real wealth. We are the disease. The death of our civilization is the cure.
If peace came off an assembly line, or could be metered, or had publishing rights that could be bought by F. Rupert Murdoch, we'd have it.
awf1047, Google "Operation Northwoods" for a clue.
If a "secure nation" was the real goal of "the powers that be," then a secure nation we would have.
Sadly, there's not enough money in a "secure nation" to allow "the powers that be" to live in the obscenely wealthy way to which they've become accustomed.
awf1047, what I'm saying to be precise is that Bush's "War on Terror" is designed to enrich the military industrial complex, give military types their jollies by allowing them to engage in some good old fashioned rapine and plunder, motivate the citizens to give the government more power. Examples are Exxon-Mobil's record profits, etc. There are of course "real" terrorists who are willing to kill innocents to make a political statement. In this category I place anyone willing to sacrifice innocent people for their cause - including most military actions by the US in the past 60 years or so and of course most "traditional" terrorists - as I said, anyone willing to sacrifice innocents. 911 was best handled with good police work, that's how Spain approached their incident. Solving it with a series of idiotic wars of aggression is .. well, idiotic.
Yeah, and when Bush took over, the price of a barrel of oil was around $20, today it's $97 and climbing.
To date, we've wasted over a trillion dollars on the unjust and illegal war with Iraq for control of THEIR oil. Imagine what we could have accomplished in the development of clean energy alternatives with a trillion dollars. For starters, by 1009, every coal and oil powered plant in the world could have been shut down.
AWF1047, you are correct, terrorists are out there. That's why we attacked and now occupy Iraq, because Osama bin Laden was in Afganastan.
To say this spending is for our freedom ike, means you buy into the 30 sec adds Rove has played all along. Look into it more. Do you feel more free after going into Iraq? Our civil liberties have been reduced and the American dollar for the 1st time is worth less than the Canadian dollar. This sucks...
HI Galen, yes I know that, I was being sarcastic. Of course Bush is gonna get bin Laden, __ dead or alive, that's why we have spent a trillion dollars fighting a war and occupying Iraq. Insanity at it's best.
What nation did the anti-democracy act of overthrowing Salvador Allende and Mohammad Mossadegh in their respective countries, replacing them with dictators - causing the deaths of many thousands? What nation decimated Panama "because it could" and indeed did? What nation "terrorized" the Vietnamese people for 15 years because of an inability to mind its own business? What nation terrorized Iraq for, at the present time, 17 years strictly on a double-cross prepetrated by the terrorizing nation?
Hint awf1047 - the same nation did ALL of these acts to all these nations and people.
The USS Cole, the bombing of two African embassies, and the destruction of the WTC (This building is symbolic of First World opulence and greed at the expense of most nations in the world) sound minor in comparison to the grievances and questions I raised as to the REAL terrorists of the world.
the visionaire/challenger to come
is not a washington insider.
afortunada-ment.
If you put all of the terrorists in the world together in one spot how big would that spot be? The size of Rhode Island? Vermont? And, we are supposed to have the biggest and bestest military in the world. We might first think about stopping arm sales to anybody and everybody that we can blackmail with arms. But, then war is profitable and the war on terrorism must be maintained to keep the elite afloat. Unfortunately Peace is not profitable. If by some miracle the entire world laid down their arms tomorrow the world economy would collapse. Then maybe the world leaders could pick up that old line of forging plowshares out of ammunition. Nutritious food and clean water, decent housing, good education, clean energy and viable economies functioning on a sustainable planet doesn't appear to be a priority to world leaders. When the wealthy have acquired all of the wealth, then what?
After the cold war ended, another war started. It was a civil war between the Republicans (who knew that the war had started because they started it) and the Democrats (who had lost by the time they even realized that they were in a war). Unconditional surrender to the Republicans took place when Al Gore conceded the election to George Bush. Oh yes he took his concession back and pretended to fight on but the war was already lost.
Now the "War on Terror" is being waged. But how to wage it when the army 'is broken' and support for the war is diminished? Easy. Sometime next year, possibly in early summer, 'terrorist' acts against the United States will prompt President Bush to do the necessary things. Declare a national emergency, suspend the constitution, postpone the elections and declare martial law. These actions have been pre-approved by Congress. Authorization for a President to do this is already enacted into law! But what then? All this to ban abortions? All this just to eliminate the tax on capitol gains? No! What comes next is reinstituition of the draft. This has all been set up in advance. The draft boards are in place now. A huge draft will reinvigorate the military and allow for a total war in the middle east. Iran is being set up to take the blame for the 'terrorist' attacks which justify all of this. So, if I am implying that Iran is not actually going to be responsible for these 'terrorist' attacks then who is? Well, possibly the 19 Saudis who were responsible for 9/11. Wait, it can't be them. They are dead. Right? So another group of middle eastern men will be set up and their passports will just happen to survive the explosion or whatever to prove that they were the culprits. Anyway, George gets his crusade in full. And Cheney gets to rule the world when the U.S.A. controls all of the oil in the middle east. ALL OF IT.
When investments in war, vehicles of excruciatingly painful death, and efficient systems of destruction win the lion's share of a nation's wealth, then it is indeed a ROTTED entity. This bloat of all the wrong values, every sacred thing sacrificed to the transitory blood profits of a few, is the great OVERDOSE to a far too materialistic/capitalist society that CANNOT sustain its inculcated appetites given what impact these THNEEDS (as Dr. Seuss referred to them) have on Earth Mother/Gaia.
The lust for violence, the celebration of force, the honor allotted to warriors of a great many irrational conflicts... all this in concert with the $ hemorrhaged on this carnal blood bath of waste is proof of MARS RULES. Jesus and the Gods of Grace have nothing to do with this calamitous inversion of ritual in false salutation to God, any god, apart from the celestial warrior.
Three things muat happen to begin turning this country around,{People like Dennis K gives me some hope}, one:publically funded elections,second: truth in media laws to prevent the government and its p[olitical arms from broadcasting falsehoods and halftruths,third:Bring the troops home now[including bushes priate army}.
As long as those pieces of paper (corporations) continue to be treated as flesh and blood citizens NOTHING will change.
Kem: Please remember that Ossama bin Ladin is a CIA asset and Al Qaeda is the joint creation of the CIA and Pakistan's ISI.
Hey, what do you think they need all that money for? Naturally, rats move underground, so you should look there. The U.S. has been burrowing deep and locating all of their major bases underground. For a clue, look at Waxahachie, Texas, which is the U.S.'s primary military command center to which even the Pentagon is subservient, although they don't like to advertise that fact. When they were originally digging it out the project was so huge that for years they had news releases describing how they were building a particle accelerator that would be over 23 miles in circumference in the hardest rock that they could find in the country. Except there was a slight problem with their description because, as everyone knows, with the advancement of science things tend to get smaller and all of the other contemporary particle accelerators in the world were in the hundred yards range and getting smaller. No problem, of course, for the U.S. military because they know their citizens are so stupid that they'll believe anything, so they just announced that they ran out of funds after the underground base was dug, which excavation only took eight years, and announced that the project was cancelled.
We have primary elections approaching. There are two things everyone needs to do to make our democracy work:
1. Think for yourself.
2. Decide who to vote for based upon the issues and who holds the positions you agree with as a matter of conscience.
If every vote did this Dennis Kucinich would win the Democratic nomination and the presidency.
Please do not let the corporate media tell you in advance of any voting who can and cannot win an election.
awf1047, you asked:
preznit are you saying that international terrorists are a con? They don't exist? Then I ask you, who blew up the USS Cole? Who blew up our two African embassies? Who flew planes into the World Trade Center? Because, I'd really like to know.
A bit disingenuous, awf.
Sure, someone did those things and we cannot say for sure whom — for lots of reasons: lack of investigations, obfuscation. Hell, impeachable offenses were committed just in the aftermath of 911, if not before or during: the one crying out for redress: TAMPERING WITH EVIDENCE!!
In all three 911 sites, all physical evidence was scooped up, carted out or buried beneath concrete before any investigation could take place. That's a federal crime. Tampering with evidence!! That's EXACTLY what happened in NYC, DC, and PA. How in hell did they get away with that? When have you heard THAT mentioned in the media or by a single one of our "representatives" in Congress???
...there's SOMETHONG wrong here, even if you can't say exactly what.
Oh...and after 911, the greatest single Security Disaster in our nation, um, NO ONE was fired! Hmmm?!
If you were the nightwatchman at a 711, and someone came in on your watch with box-cutters or machine guns, tore the place apart and set fire to it, and somehow you survived, I'll wager you'd be out of a job the next day.
No...our miscoordinators and miscommunicators and our seemingly negligent "intelligence" analysts, pretty much all got promoted.
Oh wait! Some people DID get fired...the one's who sent warnings or pointed out flaws. Right.
So, before you start making analyses and judgments, at least open your eyes to the absolute, disgustingly and insanely evil ABSURDITIES of what happened here post-911. No evidence and no investigation (until forced kicking and screaming). THAT's just so much BS.
So…just to start out the discussion here, credibility from our media and "officials" is NIL.
NOW, let's scratch the surface of decades of wanton plunder of other nations' sovereignties by our corporations, financial institutions, covert operators, and our military. The overthrow of many governments, the assassination of labor leaders and clergy who might have opposed those financial institutions' plans for their countries. The list goes on and on and on.
Any YOU pick out a few recent incidents where "some people" (we may never know who) have attacked our military presence in THEIR lands or symbolic structures in THIS land (armed with box cutters, we are told, with incredible precision, attacking major institutions, while our billion-dollar defensive systems snoozed). Right. We were so outraged at the audacity and loss of life that we threw away the evidence we might want to sift through some day….Right.
Oh, c'mon!
Who knows who did what? We certainly haven't made it easy to find out. It's much easier to accuse and go to war.
In any case this land of ours, funded by our dollars and fueled by our lack of concern and curiosity, for all too many decades meddled around in the internal affairs of other nations and cultures to the pleasure of powerful military/industrial brokers. Ad when those people dared fight back or even raise a fist, we used that as an excuse to have them imprisoned or killed by their oligarchy (if they were on our side) or we invaded when they weren't.
With this bloody trail, is it any wonder some people desire to strike back?
Those who say this is not so, or chose to ignore this ignoble, often murderous use of our resources in the past, are either ignorant, arrogant or complicit.
History speaks for itself (when allowed to). The stories and facts are all there. Myopic references to recent events with no mention or connection to history or causality, is self-serving rhetoric and not only meaningless by itself, but can only fan the flames of hatred which can lead to further injustices.
None of this is to justify brutality, but instead to lead to some understanding, sufficient to realize that peace can only come about by actively seeking it, not by fueling a monstrously sick arms race which benefits a grossly distorted and inhumane few who remain untouched by the flames.
Question: How much is enough?
Answer: One billion dollars. That should be plenty to defend the borders. The other 999 billion that the US squanders annually on war and death can be rechanneled towards the tremendous transformation we need to make to the post-carbon era.
Anyone who wants to live in a sane world is free to spend their resources as they see fit. If you are paying the bills of this profoundly criminal government you are laboring under an illusion.
When the War Department's budget is one billion dollars, then I would consider paying taxes; but never before that.
Economic inertia is motivated by corporate self interest. Focused lobbying results in continued profits. The military mind sees life as a constant battle for which contingencies are planned for 'possible' not likely attacks. The corporate mind seeks profits and tries it's best to ensure them at whatever cost to the taxpayer trough.
Imagine that the military industrial complex had it's way and the only armed power on Earth was the USA. No external threats. Total dominance. The military mind would still look for and anticipate a new potential threat that must be prepared for. The corporate mind would pounce on the expected windfall profits to be made and 'dutifully' come up with new miltary hardware to counter this 'potential' threat. UFO's ...we must not be caught unprepared for an attack from space!
Yes! While there is as yet no evidence for UFO's being out there, a coalition of military minds and corporate lobbyists have determined that a new crash program to prepare for a space based attack is necessary. The decider has decided! "We will not be caught napping when the UFO's come, this I promise the American people. No matter the cost and sacrifice, we will be ready for them whomever they are ...and er...aren't!"
Then again...it could just be cynical corporate and politically based greed. Weapons seem like a big part of our export manufacturing sector. People make big money from big weapon systems.
It could be cynical greed. Banal and bloody as it may be. Just raw greed.
Or we are preparing for the ultimate in defense program rationales... UFO DEFENSE !
Don't you realize that we are totally defenseless from an alien UFO attack? Totally defenseless. Now do you really want feel that way? The American people do not! The job of our military and defense contractors working in dedicated cooperation have come up with a long range, open ended, cost plus contract that is so secret that only they can know about what the contract says and therefore it must also be a no bid contract because ...they are the only ones who are allowed to know about it. It's classified! They classified it. Even how much it will cost...does cost...already did cost...is also classified. They only thing unclassified, is this statement, announcing that everything else is classified.
You don't want to wait for a UFO space based mushroom cloud ...do you? Once we finish SDI for missles we can immediately begin on the far more important ("We are totally vulnerable to UFO attack!") space based UFO attack ...um... defense program.
The military mind would build castle walls on a remote desert island... just in case. Lobbying would begin...etc.! The military mind when amplified by corporate lobbyists is a terrible thing to waste but it is.
In medieval times the military mind were told that we don't need a second ring of walls when the castle roof leaks and the people starve. We need to fix the roof and fix the roads and bridges. Must have been the 'second wall' lobby then too.
When is too much...ever enough to a military mind?
America is a murder machine. Whoever is elected must feed the murder machine or be murdered in his turn.
Frida Berrigan still believes, as do some of the cheerier CDers, that there are sufficient numbers of principled American citizens who can also act effectively. There is no way to get the machinery back into our hands; the only result will be that people will smash each other.
We are already reaping the whirlwind.
"preznit are you saying that international terrorists are a con? They don't exist? Then I ask you, who blew up the USS Cole? Who blew up our two African embassies? Who flew planes into the World Trade Center? Because, I'd really like to know."
A fire generated at WTC that MELTED all the 6 inch steel columns, but enabled ATTA's passport to survive and flutter to the ground.
Fires a lot cooler than the burners and steel pots and pans to make a meal on your gas burners, melted 6 inch steel columns.
A security company that controlled what happened at WTC, Dulles airport, and one of the airlines involved in 911.
The same security company had a Bush and a Walker as in W running the company.
72 hours of no electricity the Labor day weekend before 911.
No security cameras running for 72 hours when many people had access to WTC to install a new fiber0optics system.
WTC 7 fell down with no airplane hit. It just happened to have all the needed data, held by the SEC, concerning shareholder lawsuits against ENRON and WORLDCOM.
The new owner of WTC spent $125 million as a down payment. He then took out an insurance policy against any TERRORIST attack. He was awarded $7 billion , twice the value, because there were 2 planes/2 attacks.
Chaney was in charge of a military exercise to practice what to do in case of terrorists attacking America with HIGHJACKED planes. All the air defense participating was directed AWAY from the affected sites.
The pictures from the pentagon showed a hole that the fuselage just may have fit through. There is not outside wreckage. If the whole plane can not fit the hole, there must be wreckage left at the area outside the hole that could not fit. The engines have the most massive )weight to ratio of displacement) that would have surely left a mark outside of the hole, let alone leave wreckage. It is not apparent in the early views before the wall collapsed.
I am sure all that happened was just a coincidence. I have no doubts that it was anything other than incompetence on our national security services.
Believe in the Great and Powerful Ozes running our nation. Ignore that pathetic thing called obvious facts and believe in the facts coming from OZ instead. Be fearful, those witches just may keep you from finding out you already have a heart, brain, and a home.
We must find a way to elevate the thinking of those who want to continue to "wage perpetual war for perpetual peace" to use Gore Vidal's wonderful title. No one will survive, let alone have a chance to live a sane, happy life in a culture driven by hegemonic ambitions.
Many thanks to people like Frida Berrigan and Chalmers Johnson who challenge American triumphalism. It is the greatest threat to our long-term security.
awf1047...Right off hand, I would recommend two books, although there are now literally thousands out there.....John Perkins..."Confessions of an Economic Hit Man" and more recent, "The Secret History of the American Empire". You can go to 911dvdproject.com for free (or a contribution) DVDs that may help you see the truth.
American wage slaves need to free themselves from their corporate masters.
By any means necessary?
"If you put all of the terrorists in the world together in one spot how big would that spot be? The size of Rhode Island? Vermont?"
Hardly!
If you exclude all those so-called "terrorists" who are ligitimately fighting againse foreign occupation and US puppets i.e. Iraq, Afghanistan and Pakistan, and even the attackers of the US Cole - a military target, therefore not terorism. Then all the anti-US "terrorists" would probably fit in an average sized US McMansion!.
So, for this, we maintain 10,000 nuclear bombs and a vast oil-guzzling air force and navy, and hundreds of bases arrayed around the world?
Would we tolerate, say, China bribing our politicians to build huge, noisy, polluting, nuclear-armed air force bases all over our country - it's drunken soldiers, comitting crime, mischief, and even occasional rapes and assualts with complete legal innumity while showing complete contempt for our culture?* If a group of vigilanties started car-bombing popular hangouts of these foreign soldiers and their mercenary contractors, I would disagree with their violent tactics, but I certainly wouldn't call them "terrorists".
Why is this so difficult for Americans to understand?
*This is just an analogy, real Chinese soldiers wouldn't do such things as they have much more integrity and moral discipline than the bubbas that join the US army or air force.
"THERE WILL BE NO PEACE DIVIDEND." President George H.W. Bush after the fall of the USSR....
Ohioan: Every last one of your claims has been debunked. Years ago.
Actually, I was following those events fairly closely at the time of 911 and I never could discern any plane wreakage where that airliner headed for the white house supposedly crashed in the field. Even the close up pictures that they showed live that day only revealed a shallow crater in the hard ground, similar to a single ordnance explosion, and there was no underbrush or trees at that spot to obscure an airliner's remains. So if they debunked that supposed crash I haven't heard the convincing argument. Perhaps someone with more convincing data from whichever official debunking room could post a clear link that would satisfy whichever suspicions.
"I never could discern any plane wreakage where that airliner headed for the white house supposedly crashed in the field."
The plane that crashed in PA was going at *full speed* on impact. This differetiates the crash from just about any other that we hear of, including the other three that day. Google "debunking 911" for many sites that will help explain.
I have seen several cases - pictures and in person of ordinary small building fires causing steel columns to bend over like hairpins. But no, they didn't "melt" they dont have to melt, only soften. Any steel heated to a glowing cherry red color has lost 95% of its strength.
The analogy of a pot on a stove is a false one. The heat developed in a fire, all else being equal, is a function of the size of the fire, due to geometry and phyiscs (volume vs surface area relationship) and the rate that the energy produced can radiate or convect away from the heat producing reaction - the bigger the fire, the hotter the center of it needs become to achieve steady-state heat radiation, in accordance with the Lapace equation. A stove or small campfire won't soften steel very much, but a large bonfire or house-sized fire with a good air supply will soften steel to clay consistency or even melt it.
Frankly, I am amazed I even have to explain this in such ridiculously techical terms - hasn't anyone played with steel bars around a bonfire, heated and bent steel with an ordinary propane torch - or at least seen a movie of an old fashoned blacksmith? What has happened to the technical-common sense of Americans?
I was assigned to a crash investigation team in the 1960s. On one crash, a four engine C-130 went nose first into the ground at a speed of approx 260 knots. The only thing above ground was a large portion of the vertical stabalizer, parts of two engines and two mangeled props. The crash scene was a large anthill looking mound of dirt with some smoke drifting out of the hole in the center of the mound. When dug out, the entire aircraft was only fourteen feet long. The crash site for the hijacked aircraft was not unusual at all.
What a funny dust-off! *full speed* So that means the airliner hit a time warp and skewed out into an alternate universe, does it? Even the space shuttle Columbia left wreakage strewn all over the ground when it crashed and it was traveling much faster than any jetliner could and it was also burning up as it entered the atmosphere to boot. But then, maybe the space shuttle Columbia wasn't traveling at *full speed*.
That's bullshit. An object intersecting hard ground does not bury itself without leaving a displacement and there was no such around the imaginary crash site in "Shanksville". Further, there is a branch of science that you are obviously not familiar with, which is called physics, which determines that there is a maximum velocity any particular object can attain inside a known gravity. And no aircraft made of metal can attain such a required high velocity which would cause it to leave no trace of it's molecular construction at a crash site, whether it is above ground, underground or underwater. And, before proffering another stupid reply, you should spend a little time studying Einstein's Relativity.
Just in case you missed it, check out these aerial photos of the supposed crash site,
http://killtown.911review.org/flight93/gallery.html#aerial
and explain how the shallow indentations where the wings supposedly impacted could be so perfectly defined and yet have no wing parts in them? Not to mention the total lack of parts anywhere.
"a time warp and skewed out into an alternate universe,"
Dude!
"aerial photos" won't show the flight data recorder, the cockpit voice recorder, and other debris that were recovered at the site.