Category: Industrial Military complex

Industrial Military complex

Merger Mania in the Military-Industrial Complex – CounterPunch.org

Merger mania exists among  the Military suppliers along with their power to influence policy.

Last November, the Department of Defense once again failed to pass even a basic audit, as it had several times before. In fact, independent auditors weren’t even able to assess the Pentagon’s full financial picture because they couldn’t gather all the necessary information to complete an evaluation. In some ways, that should have been devastating, the equivalent of a child receiving an incomplete on an end-of-year report card. No less alarming, the Pentagon couldn’t even account for about 61% of its $3.5 trillion in assets. Yet the last Congress still approved $858 billion in defense programs for fiscal year 2023, a full $45 billion more than even the Biden administration requested.

Source: Merger Mania in the Military-Industrial Complex – CounterPunch.org

Industrial Military complex

Hi-Tech Military Weapons Breed New Danger

Artificial intelligence, lethal autonomous weapons, hypersonic missiles, cyber battles: The Arms Control Association rings alarm bells over the rush to develop these and other advanced military technologies.

Source: Hi-Tech Military Weapons Breed New Danger

Industrial Military complex

Weapons Contractors Destroy Lives While Reading Fairy Tales To Children – scheerpost.com

You probably already know that, as reported by Alex Kane for In These Times in 2019, “Saudi Arabia, one of the world’s richest countries, has been bombing Yemen, the fifth-poorest nation in the world, since 2015—with support from the United States.”

Dan Sabbagh of The Guardian reported in 2020 that “BAE Systems sold £15bn worth of arms to Saudis during Yemen assault.” That number is two years old. It’s many billions higher now.

BAE Systems doesn’t want us to only think of them as serial murderers. According to their Public Relations Department, they are also interested in reading fairy tales to children.

Source: Weapons Contractors Destroy Lives While Reading Fairy Tales To Children – scheerpost.com

Industrial Military complex

U.S. military agreement setting Australia up as launching pad for war

An agreement authorising the U.S. militarisation of Australia needs to be terminated before our nation is dragged into war, writes Bevan Ramsden.

Source: U.S. military agreement setting Australia up as launching pad for war

Industrial Military complex

US Weapons Makers Set to Profit as Japan Readies $320 Billion Military Buildup

People gather in front of Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida's office in Tokyo on December 9, 2022 to protest the government's plan to double military spending.

Japan, a professed pacifist nation since the end of World War II, is set to become the planet’s third-biggest military spender. It will be armed with U.S.-built missiles capable of striking China.

Source: US Weapons Makers Set to Profit as Japan Readies $320 Billion Military Buildup

Industrial Military complex

The Arms Industry Owns Congress

The new $850 billion military budget, which the House just approved and the Senate will take up soon, is a giveaway to the arms industry. Is it a coincidence that House supporters of the bill got seven times more money from military contractors than opponents?

Source: The Arms Industry Owns Congress

Industrial Military complex, Military- Industrial Complex

Defense Bill Heralds Bonanza for U.S. War Industry

The B-21 Raider is unveiled during a ceremony at Northrop Grumman's Air Force Plant 42 in Palmdale, California, December 2, 2022. The high-tech stealth bomber can carry nuclear and conventional weapons and is designed to be able to fly without a crew on board and is on track to cost nearly $700 million per plane.

The Biden White House has shown no sign of pumping the brakes on Ukraine spending and arms transfers. Biden also has made clear he intends to push ahead with the aggressive U.S. military buildup in preparation for future conflict with China, a position with widespread backing across the aisle. With a divided Congress, the 2024 elections looming, and the Trump question hovering over it all, a lot of the Democrats’ legislative agenda will be tough to implement after the new year. But the short and long-term future looks bright for the Russia and China hawks, the defense industry, and its Democratic and Republican patrons on Capitol Hill. On these matters, bipartisanship remains alive and well. The House could vote on the NDAA as soon as this week, and the Senate is expected to swiftly follow suit to get the bill to Biden’s desk.

Source: Defense Bill Heralds Bonanza for U.S. War Industry

Industrial Military complex

War Industry Looks Forward to “Multiyear Authority” in Ukraine

ARLINGTON, VIRGINIA - NOVEMBER 16: Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Gen. Mark Milley speaks during a press briefing after a virtual Ukraine Defense Contact Group meeting at the Pentagon on November 16, 2022 in Arlington, Virginia. The Ukraine Defense Contact Group met again to discuss aiding for Ukraine amid Russia’s invasion. (Photo by Alex Wong/Getty Images)

Eisenhower warned that “we must guard against the acquisition of unwarranted influence, whether sought or unsought, by the military-industrial complex.”

Source: War Industry Looks Forward to “Multiyear Authority” in Ukraine

Industrial Military complex

The Ukraine Aid Bill Is a Massive Windfall for US Military Contractors

Australia wanted to get in on the act with the Morrison Government promoting us manufacturers not just consumers with Peter Dutton Defense Minister. We were in the import-export business exporting Bushmasters providing territory for bases and even buying 121 tanks. Tanks that proved to be absolutely useless given that even better Russian ones were being blown to smithereens in Ukraine.

Joe Biden has signed a $40 billion aid bill to Ukraine. But the biggest beneficiary isn’t ordinary Ukrainians — it’s the US military contractors set to receive at least $17 billion in additional revenue.

Source: The Ukraine Aid Bill Is a Massive Windfall for US Military Contractors

Industrial Military complex

”The Spoils of War”: How Profits Define Success for Pentagon

An aerial of the the Pentagon in Washington, D.C., on May 12, 2021.

Pentagon = Profit = The Industrial Military Complex = Economy

Cockburn aptly quotes one Pentagon weapons designer in the 1960s telling new hires that they would be making “weapons that don’t work to meet threats that don’t exist.”

If you’re still not convinced, the proof of this unpalatable pudding is in the eating. Consider America’s just-concluded 20-year war in Afghanistan. As the Taliban took over the country in days, it might have seemed that the whole thing was a colossal failure. But if you check your portfolio of defense contractor stocks, and visit the enormous mansions in the northern Virginia suburbs surrounding the Pentagon, you’ll see that, in fact, it was an incredible success.

Source: ”The Spoils of War”: How Profits Define Success for Pentagon

Industrial Military complex

Where did the $5tn spent on Afghanistan and Iraq go? Here’s where | Linda J Bilmes | The Guardian

Defense industry professionals look at a military vehicle on display at an arms fair in the Netherlands.

Private military contractors outnumbered US troops on the ground during most of both conflicts. And defense industry stocks soared

While Washington bickers about what, if anything, has been achieved after 20 years and nearly $5tn spent on “forever wars”, there is one clear winner: the US defense industry.

Source: Where did the $5tn spent on Afghanistan and Iraq go? Here’s where | Linda J Bilmes | The Guardian

Industrial Military complex

‘Fortress USA’: How the September 11 terror attacks produced a military industrial juggernaut

Since the September 11 terror attacks, there has been no hiding from the increased militarisation of the United States. Everyday life is suffused with policing and surveillance. This ranges from the inconvenient, such as removing shoes at the airport, to the dystopian, such as local police departments equipped with decommissioned tanks too big to use on regular roads.

Source: ‘Fortress USA’: How the September 11 terror attacks produced a military industrial juggernaut

Industrial Military complex

A masterful PR campaign: the links between Hollywood, luxury cars and the arms industry – Michael West

Luxury cars are inextricably linked with the weapons industry. When James Bond saves the world in his faithful Aston Martin he is glamourising the very industry he is ostensibly trying to defeat. Tasha May reports.

A masterful PR campaign: the links between Hollywood, luxury cars and the arms industry – Michael West
Industrial Military complex, Uncategorized

Outrage After Trump, Advancing “Alarming Desire to Sow Chaos Abroad,” Uses Loophole to Send US Bombs to Saudis | Common Dreams News

A Yemeni boy rides a bike on rubble of houses destroyed in a recent airstrike carried out by warplanes of the Saudi-led coalition, on May 23, 2019 in Sana'a, Yemen. (Photo: Mohammed Hamoud/Getty Images)

Critics of the U.S.-supported bombing of Yemen rebuked the Trump administration on Saturday after it ducked congressional approval by invoking emergency powers to approve billions of dollars in American-made arms sales to Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates.

“Selling more weapons to Saudi Arabia doesn’t make America safer or align with our country’s values,” said Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) in a tweet. “It only benefits defense contractors and @realDonaldTrump’s alarming desire to sow chaos abroad.”

via Outrage After Trump, Advancing “Alarming Desire to Sow Chaos Abroad,” Uses Loophole to Send US Bombs to Saudis | Common Dreams News

Industrial Military complex, Uncategorized

How Trump is Turning US Diplomats into Arms Merchants to the World

New York ( Tomdispatch.com) – American weapons makers have dominated the global arms trade for decades. In any given year, they’ve accounted for somewhere between one-third and more than one-half the value of all international weapons sales. It’s hard to imagine things getting much worse — or better, if you happen to be an arms trader — but they could, and soon, if a new Trump rule on firearms exports goes through.

via How Trump is Turning US Diplomats into Arms Merchants to the World

Industrial Military complex

139 House Democrats Join GOP to Approve $717 Billion in Military Spending

With the help of 139 Democrats, the House of Representatives on Thursday easily rammed through the 2019 National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA), which—if it passes the Senate—will hand President Donald Trump $717 billion in military spending.

What Trump didn’t mention is that Iran’s so-called “threat” against the United States came after a Reuters report revealed that the White House—led by Secretary of State Mike Pompeo and national security adviser John Bolton—has launched a secret effort to “foment unrest” inside Iran, which critics described as an obvious push for regime change.

via 139 House Democrats Join GOP to Approve $717 Billion in Military Spending

Industrial Military complex

You may not have liked the past Year but the Arms Industry Loved It | Informed Comment

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with profits flowing, and political clout solidifying, the arms industry will begin 2018 happier than ever. President Obama was a good friend to them, approving more than double the value of arms sales reached by George W. Bush. Trump, it seems, will be even better.

You may not have liked the past Year but the Arms Industry Loved It | Informed Comment