Smedley Butler

[rickrock305]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Smedley_Butler

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


War is just a racket. A racket is best described, I believe, as something that is not what it seems to the majority of people. Only a small inside group knows what it is about. It is conducted for the benefit of the very few at the expense of the masses.

I believe in adequate defense at the coastline and nothing else. If a nation comes over here to fight, then we'll fight. The trouble with America is that when the dollar only earns 6 percent over here, then it gets restless and goes overseas to get 100 percent. Then the flag follows the dollar and the soldiers follow the flag.

I wouldn't go to war again as I have done to protect some lousy investment of the bankers. There are only two things we should fight for. One is the defense of our homes and the other is the Bill of Rights. War for any other reason is simply a racket.

There isn't a trick in the racketeering bag that the military gang is blind to. It has its "finger men" to point out enemies, its "muscle men" to destroy enemies, its "brain men" to plan war preparations, and a "Big Boss" Super-Nationalistic-Capitalism.

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.

I suspected I was just part of a racket at the time. Now I am sure of it. Like all the members of the military profession, I never had a thought of my own until I left the service. My mental faculties remained in suspended animation while I obeyed the orders of higher-ups. This is typical with everyone in the military service.

I helped make Mexico, especially Tampico, safe for American oil interests in 1914. I helped make Haiti and Cuba a decent place for the National City Bank boys to collect revenues in. I helped in the raping of half a dozen Central American republics for the benefits of Wall Street. The record of racketeering is long. I helped purify Nicaragua for the international banking house of Brown Brothers in 1909-1912 (where have I heard that name before?). I brought light to the Dominican Republic for American sugar interests in 1916. In China I helped to see to it that Standard Oil went its way unmolested.

During those years, I had, as the boys in the back room would say, a swell racket. Looking back on it, I feel that I could have given Al Capone a few hints. The best he could do was to operate his racket in three districts. I operated on three continents.


Any thoughts?

[SeriousStudent]

Major General Butler was one of only two Marines ever to receive the Medal of Honor twice. To say I respect his heroism would be a vast understatement.

It's possible to honor a man's service, and disagree with their political opinions. Ask anyone that did not vote for Presidential candidate John McCain several years ago.

That's all I think about that.

[montanadave]

A careful reckoning of history with the benefit of 20/20 hindsight would indicate, unfortunately, that Major General Smedley Butler was right on the money (no pun intended).

In the ubiquitous fog of war, the lofty ideals which we as a people so proudly and publicly proclaim are manipulated and compromised by the self-interest of the plutocracy which has subverted our democratic republic. That their goals are all too often achieved through the sacrifice of one of our most precious resources, the young men and women who volunteer to serve in our armed forces, is all the more tragic.

[rickrock305]

A careful reckoning of history with the benefit of 20/20 hindsight would indicate, unfortunately, that Major General Smedley Butler was right on the money (no pun intended).

In the ubiquitous fog of war, the lofty ideals which we as a people so proudly and publicly proclaim are manipulated and compromised by the self-interest of the plutocracy which has subverted our democratic republic. That their goals are all too often achieved through the sacrifice of one of our most precious resources, the young men and women who volunteer to serve in our armed forces, is all the more tragic.


pretty much

[Mr. Goodtimes]

I agree. America needs to quit sticking it's nose in other peoples business; but we have done it for 200 years so why stop now? Instead of trying to "bring democracy" to a bunch of goat ****ers that dont want it or arent willing to fight for it, why don't we just kill them and then leave like we intended to do ten years ago?

I believe that the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan were started for the right reasons (to kill the bad guys) but then quickly went the other way.

If somebody harms American citizens either at home or abroad, I believe we should come to your country, kick down your door, kill you and everybody that supports you and then leave. Thats it. Enough with this nation building diplomacy bullshit.

Maybe instead of trying to stabilize the middle east (to protect oil and international assets) we should just let the middle east self destruct and drill for our own oil.

Maybe instead of setting up a no fly zone over Libya we should set one up over the boarder. Maybe instead of trying to fix other peoples corrupt governments we should fix out own.

Globalism sucks.

[Irish]

Here's the full version of War is a Racket. Fantastic read by an out****ingstanding Marine! http://www.ratical.org/ratville/CAH/warisaracket.html

[dookie1481]

It's fascinating that Smedley Butler's stature among Marines is so incongruous with his political beliefs. I heard his name a zillion times in boot camp but hadn't even heard of War is a Racket until about two years ago.

[Irish]

The history of U.S. military interventions is very interesting as well. http://academic.evergreen.edu/g/grossmaz/interventions.html

[Redmanfms]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Smedley_Butler

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




Any thoughts?

I agree with Butler. War is a horrible endeavor and frequently an unneeded exercise. Our ideals have been perverted and misrepresented to encourage a "war footing" many times.

It's worth noting that military interventionism is a long-loved tactic of the progressive movement. That supposedly "conservative" presidents like Bush I and II engaged in it proves just how insidious and infective progressive ideals have been. The last true conservative was Goldwater, and even he wasn't averse to a war in SE Asia (though, much to his credit, he demanded that it be a declared war).

My libertarian isolationism is all the more comforting.

[Redmanfms]

Double post, server issues last night.

[glocktogo]

I agree with him. The two most recent wars have been a virtual orgy for the defense contractors. Billions of dollars have changed hands and we can't really say we're any more secure now than we were prior to 9/11. What's slightly unusual this time around is that war spending hasn't bouyed the economy enough to overcome the treasonous mismanagement of the financial sectors. History repeats itself no matter how smart the current elite think they are.

[Cincinnatus]

As a historian, I'll chime in.
Remember the historical context of what Butler was addressing. He was not talking about, as Eisenhower did, the military industrial complex necessarily. He WAS addressing the military interventions of the US in the age of Small Wars in Nicaragua, Haiti, etc. where, under Taft's Dollar Diplomacy policy, the US intervened to essentially defend American business interests in these tiny countries that were threatened by some form of domestic instability such as: inability to pay back debts to European bankers, or else revolution or anarchy.

So Butler was right about the reasons for US intervention at least in Latin America. Keep in mind, too, that Butler had also lived through the 1920s where it was in vogue to react negatively against the incredibly high costs of World War I (though Europe suffered far more overall, the year and a half of US involvement incurred casualties higher than any other US war up to that time except the Civil War). Specifically, there was a fashionable theory held by many Americans that World War I was only fought by the US because of the profits to be gleaned by weapons makers, and also to protect the investments of American bankers--the US had loaned more to Britain and France than to Germany and so of course intervened on their side. There were even congressional investigations into these matters.
While this theory certainly looked legitimate at the time based on the appearance of things on the surface, and Butler was certainly convinced of this, the actual historical record does not support this theory concerning World War I. Arms races certainly had a role in the coming of World War I, but this was tangential to other factors, particularly in the case of the US, which were national honor, and the defense of aggrieved US sovereignty, violated on the high seas by Germany in the use of unrestricted U-boat warfare, was decisive.

As a Marine historian, I have nothing but respect for Smedley Butler, he and Dan Daly are some of my heroes, but is important to place every historical opinion in context and not read events that come in later decades into that time.

As to Marines not having popular political positions for their service, one need look no further than Evans Carlson, who, while stationed in China, where Communists were rampant, became as pinko, red, commie as they come.