Memorial Day commemorates soldiers killed in war. We are told
that the war dead died for us and our freedom. US
Marine General Smedley Butler challenged this view. He said that our
soldiers died for the profits of the bankers, Wall Street, Standard Oil, and the
United Fruit Company. Here is an excerpt from a speech that he gave in 1933:
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.
Most American soldiers died fighting foes who posed no
threat to the United States. Our soldiers died for secret agendas of which they
knew nothing. Capitalists hid their self-interests behind the flag, and our boys
died for the One Percent’s bottom line.
Jade Helm, an exercise that pits the US military against the
US public, is scheduled to run July 15 through September 15. What is the secret
agenda behind Jade Helm?
The Soviet Union was a partial check on capitalist looting in
the 1950s, 1960s, 1970s, and 1980s. However, with the Soviet collapse capitalist
looting intensified during the Clinton, Bush, and Obama regimes.
Neoliberal Globalization is now looting its own constituent
parts and the planet itself. Americans, Greeks, Irish, British, Italians,
Ukrainians, Iraqis, Libyans, Argentinians, the Spanish and Portuguese are being
looted of their savings, pensions, social services, and job opportunities, and
the planet is being turned into a wasteland by capitalists sucking the last
penny out of the environment. As Claudia von Werlhof writes, predatory
capitalism is consuming the globe.
http://www.globalresearch.ca/neoliberal-globalization-is-there-an-alternative-to-plundering-the-earth/24403
We need a memorial day to commemorate the victims of neoliberal globalization.
All of us are its victims, and in the end the capitalists also.
Dr. Paul Craig Roberts was Assistant Secretary of the
Treasury for Economic Policy and associate editor of the Wall Street Journal. He
was columnist for Business Week, Scripps Howard News Service, and Creators
Syndicate. He has had many university appointments. His internet columns have
attracted a worldwide following. Roberts' latest books are The Failure of Laissez Faire Capitalism and Economic
Dissolution of the West and How America Was Lost.
Paul Craig Roberts; Police Have Been Militarized Sees Public as
Enemy,Dollar Implosion
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