You raise some good points, but even while I agree with you on our foolishness, I think you make some errors. Having a conscript military force in the past seems to have done jack squat for restraining it's use. The Civil War, World War 2 and Vietnam were far bloodier (we came in too late during WW1 for it to be so bad). Yglesias put's on his whiggish hat and discusses how much more averse to war we've become:
http://yglesias.thinkprogress.org/2011/03/shifting-attitudes-toward-war/
Similarly, centuries ago when the elite was practically DEFINED by virtue of its being a military caste, it was not averse to war.

And I can't let Sullivan's error go unmentioned. Since he doesn't have comments, I'll have to do so here. Rome was indeed a republic for a reasonable amount of time, but the Spanish and British empires grew out of monarchies. Cromwell did very briefly form a commonwealth, but it's regarded as hardly counting. The enduring nature of America's "regime change" is also why I'd say his comparison of England & France is inapt.

After my time at Harvard I learned that very often we work ourselves into these argumentative labyrinths because of a) unstated assumptions or b) excessive use of academese. Prof. Walt rallies against US military action and seems to enjoy skewering Americans' confidence, which he disparagingly labels the "exceptionalism myth." Well, I have a very simple explanation for why Americans agree to enter wars, and it avoids the very tepid, contorted explanations above.

An American would say we intervene because we feel a moral obligation, as PEOPLE, to help others in need. This is not an obligation we feel as "exceptional Americans," or because we just have to use weapons, or because our leaders are arrogant, or because we don't care about domestic programs. It is because we know that to stand by as others suffer is bad, is WRONG. And this is a sense of wrong understood all around the world.

And a point of fact. Prof. Walt seems intent on claiming that it is never justifiable to sacrifice domestic welfare programs in favor of foreign intervention. Really? 1) Does he think the Viagra benefit for retired teachers is worth more than the right of foreign peoples to not live under tyranny? 2) The Iraq war is said to have cost 700 Bn. Let's just say 1 Tn over 10 yrs, which is about 100 Bn a year. This amounts to .7% annual GDP. Given that federal and state receipts amount to 40% GDP (Fed is 2.8 Tn alone) I have to call bullshit on the claim the country is bankrupting itself by going to war with Lybia. This is not the UK fighting Nazi Germany in the greatest war of human history. We're bankrupting ourselves supporting every inane "domestic welfare" proposal ever written.

Perhaps it is Prof. Walt that is the exceptionalist, as apparently we're not supposed to care for suffering non-Americans. But perhaps his limited range of moral concern makes him the exception to a world that has increasingly learned to look beyond race, creed, and nation in understanding the moral responsibilities shared by all people.

Prof. Walt, as a political scientist your role is to try to explain as much using the tools of your discipline. It's plausible you are reaching untenable conclusions when you ignore the role off moral beliefs and the power of ethical ideas to shape human action. Sometimes people do things that are not directly beneficial for the simple reason that they think it is the right thing to do. And I think that is just fine - for what should one live if he's not supposed to defend basic moral decency?

Not disagreeing with the drivers but I do think a 6th driver which is merely referenced as "I've no doubt that one could add more items to this list (e.g., the passive press etc.." is actually one of the key factors. And not merely a passive press...

With rolling 24hr news the visibility of even relatively minor events in far away countries is raised. Along with that the media also operates as it's own agenda setter: 'Something terrible has happened! What can be done?!'. Before long it is no longer someone elses problem: it becomes ours.

Questions to the Whitehouse spokesman, start with 'what's the President's view' and then morph into 'When is the President going to intervene' and before you know it the whole event begins to build it's own momentum.. eventually in some situations military intervention is the natural end point of a series of self perpetuating escalations in media reporting.

Gleeful armchair generals in studios across the western world anticipate and to a large degree drive public opinion before it, and then the question is not just 'when is the president going to intervene', but more "WHY isn't the president intervening".

Mad mad world.

I feel that the biggest factor to this is Congress. They have given up so much of their role in FP that FP seems to be conducted on a whim rather than a doctrine.

Many years ago this country had a 2-party system. There were serious disagreements about foreign involvements. Since 1947 the two parties have merged into a 1.1- or possibly 1.05-party system with a strong addiction to war. Another sign of this addiction is secrecy, which has grown steadily since the "security state" was set up in the late 1940's.

"Defense" and related "security" activities now cost the country 1 trillion dollars a year. Cut that by 40 percent for ten years and you arrive at an amount equal to the congressional Republicans' deficit reduction plan. But the problem is-- the country has an addiction. Treatment facilities are nonexistent in our 1.05-party system.

6. Men love war! (See Hedges and Junger)

With all due respect, our military actions in Iraq and Afghanistan are not wars, and ought not be called wars. They are occupations.

Calling them 'wars' gives them undue moral weight, and helps continue them indefinitely, to the profit of our arms industry and at the expense of our nation (to say nothing of theirs). Calling them 'wars' justifies infringing on civil rights. And since wars must be won or lost, the 'wars' in Iraq and Afghanistan can never end, because we don't have an enemy to defeat.

Occupations, on the other hand, are mean little things that justify no curtailment of civil rights. And occupations can only be ended, they are not won.

So please, call these occupations. And call our foreign policy in the Mideast what it is: the imperialism of a dying nation.

"Well, we like war. We like war, we are war like people. We like war, because we are good at it. You know why we are good at it? Because we did a lot of practice. This country is only 200 years old and already we have had 10 major wars. We average a major war every 20 years in this country, so we are good at it! And that is good thing we are, we are not very good in anything else anymore. Can't built a decent car, can't make a TV set or VCR where the fuck. Got no steel industry left, can't educate our young people can't get health care for our old people, but we can bomb the shit out of your country alright?! Especially if your country is full of brown people. Oh, we like that, don't we? That's our hobby! That's our new job in the world, bombing brown people! Iraq, Panama, Granada, Libya, you got some brown people in your country, tell them to watch the fuck out or we will god damn bomb them! Well, when is the last white people you can remember that we bombed. Can you remember the last white people? Can you remember any white people, we have ever bombed? The Germans! Those are the only ones and that is only because they were trying to cutting in our action."

1. A previous comment mentioned the role of idealism in U.S. overseas military adventures, and indeed Prof. Walt might consider the range of attitudes that appears to motivate U.S. foreign policy as described by Walter Russel Mead in his book "Special Providence."

2. When Prof. Walt says "The United States started out as 13 small and vulnerable colonies clinging to the east coast of North America," he appears to be describing the early, religiously motivated colonization of the 1600s. By the mid 1700s, the English colonies had massively evolved and were a populous and expansionary force. The westward and overseas movement of the 1800s was a linear continuation of the French and Indian War.

3. In addition to the creation of a large standing army in 1945 (Prof. Walt's reason no. 1), another recent development that further predisposes the U.S. to military adventures is the unification in the late 1970s of the military's home region (the old Confederacy) with its political party (the Republican Party).

This FP article is ignoring the elephant in the room: the ONLY reason the United States is always waging war, exports weapons and violence around the world and props up brutal dictatorships is to prop up its obscene, vicious, inhumane and utterly failed capitalist economics. America's wars feed the military-industrial complex Eisenhower warned us against which in turn feeds the 1% ruling class who currently hold dictatorial control of the united states. These pigs sacrifice our young in illegal, unnecessary and immoral wars, murder tens of millions of innocents throughout the world and are parasites on the backs of workers everywhere. The capitalists have made the U.S. into a rogue nation that will suffer total economic collapse ala the Soviet Union, be put down and destroyed by foreign powers as the mad dog it is, or, hopefully, will be forged into a new socialist nation in the flames of revolution against its ruling class by the American people.

Bush advocated preemptive war for self defense. Obama has bested him by calling for preemptive war to defend OTHER people. Well done.

I think this is great article but I want to give an alternate view on your 5 points

1) “Because we can.” Your right to many times we use war as a mean to solve there problems in the world. But sometime war is the only tool available to solve the problem. Case in point Rwandan Genocide in1994 the mass murder of an estimated 800,000 people. I truly think that had the United Nations or United States sent in the military we would never have had such atrocities occur.
2) “The US has no serious enemies.” Sure we do. Don’t assume that the next enemy is going to land a military force on New York City and take over the country. Warfare is no longer symmetrical and in fact to expensive to fight in that style. Warfare will be Asymmetrical computer virus will infect a network. You weaken the economy of your enemy you will weaken the military it supports. Death by 1000 small cuts.
3) “The All-Volunteer Force. “ I don’t know if this applies but Israel has won just about every military war it has been involved and they are quick to start a military action. I think it should be looked into don’t you.
4) “It's the Establishment, Stupid.” The establishment has always been stupid nothing new their. I mean give me a break I can honestly count when the establishment got it right. Maybe we should make it mandatory reading for every elected official Sun Tzu’s Art of War.
5) “Congress Has Checked Out.” That’s the easy response they have checked out. But let’s be clear on this issue so has the rest of our country. One of the greatest technological powers of this country was the information superhighway. It’s because of this technology and the media that people our more informed but the information is more false. Their use to be a time when news was Who, What When Where, Why and How, now we get our news from opinion news casters that deliver what they believe is true and use spin to deliver the message so is it true or is it spin.

I notice a tendency to blame the right a lot in your writing. Let me tell you that there's a large group on the right that are just as dismayed by the abuse of military projection into conflicts that do not affect our national interests as you are. Circulate a little more, develop some conservative friends, and balance your perspective.

Great article! It's always been about money, power..and yes ego! What I would love to know are the certain people that are for this; I wish the author could provide the names.

Great article.
There is a saying that absolute power corrupts absolutely.
Our so called democracy is really a plutocracy that has infiltrated our businesses, military industrial complex, and our government.
Now that we have an empire, the powers that be want to maintain it.
Therefore, war is essential to keep those at bay who may threaten it.

No way. We only bomb things for recreation. We can quit anytime we want. It's under conbtrol.

In one of the Federalist Papers, Madison says, "Ambition must be made to counter ambition." That is, Congress will protect its perogatives against the executive, one of course being the right to start wars.

But every elected official is so fat now, they just acquiesce as the ideas in the Constitution go down the toilet.

And the author says it a bit differently, but when all you have is a hammer, everything looks like a nail.

And our only export now is death. We have to hammer everything that comes along.

They should change the name of the DoD to 'Department of Death'.

Walt

Lurking beneath those five is this: The US wants to maintain its waning economic and military dominance of the world so we can maintain our gluttonous consumption at home.

The days of blue-collar parents having a big house, two cars, an RV, a boat, sending their four kids to college, a comfy retirement with lots of travel home and abroad, and helping their grown kids and their kids financially are gone. That reality has been dawning on Americans as a population.

Anyway, I wanted to revisit the first reason you mentioned and sort of shrugged off the idea of American Exceptionalism. While I do not subscribe to the popular lore of the American values being exceptional, I believe that as still the sole superpower in the world, America does have some responsibilities.

One of these responsibilities is to answer an internationally popular cry for help. Libya is an example of one such event where the "collective conscience" of the international community is forced to act.
America, as the sole superpower has adopted a sort of "social contract" with the rest of the world where for the guarantee of international stability, the countries of the world devolves certain powers and "allows" America to be the proud hegemon.

This hegemony is largely predictable and therefore secure for the functions of society. America is allowed certain transgressions like profiting from this responsibility through lucrative foreign business opportunities like in the Arab world. Other transgressions like the illegal war in Iraq are condemned but that is a far as the international community would take it as it needs America to enforce the “social contract” and to prevent anarchy.
Now, as the situation in Libya grew dire, the international community’s “collective conscience” was under attack. The news media focused on the Libyan state’s perversely aggressive policies against its own people and the imminent danger of atrocities on a genocidal scale. As the light shone on the international community, it had no choice but to act and demonstrate to themselves the humanity in their civilizations.

The world now turns to the hegemon to carry out its part of the contract thus the EU, UN, OIC and the Arab League attempt to persuade President Obama to intervene and present the humane and caring face of our civilization. This is done so you and I can feel good about ourselves, feel good about the fact that we care about humanity, that we are good people.

Therefore, it is in America’s interest as it is for any Leviathan to fulfill its obligations and preserve this “social contract” and in turn maintain its hegemony in the world.

Democracy was a radical idea in 1776 and when the Constitution was written and adopted in 1789. Ever since we've been fighting Old World monarchs and families of monarchies interconnected vertically among countries; emperors, dynasties of emperors, fascist dictators and communist totalitarians. We've been busy little bees defending our democracy, our First Amendment and Constitutional rule of law, our way of life to prosperity, our belief in science, equality, feminist, human rights, technology, secularism, economic and personal intellectual development and a good old slap on the back hello instead of throwing ourselves at the feet of some Old World throwback monarch, Middle East tyrant or Beijing censoring reactionary dictatorship. Gadhafi is one of a long line of tyrants who sooner or later get as they deserve.

America's burden, if you will.

So you go through the reasons one by one hoping to find where Oil or access to resources is mentioned. And you fail miserably.

At least we did not see a "Going to war in order to spread peace and democracy".

I wanted to write my master's thesis on this question of why we just love costly, low-return wars, but I had a hard time finding a way to frame it, especially in a realist way. I think one of the big structural realists needs to tackle seriously the question of what happens if you succeed. Mearsheimer writes in "Tragedy of Great Power Politics" that all states want regional hegemony but aren't supposed to be able to get it, and then doesn't predict what would happen if a great power got lucky and pulled it off. I think we really need some solid work done on the "what's next?" after that. I don't think structure gets you there - I think we need the human nature/neoclassical realists to finish the job, but maybe there's some universally applicable maxim to help make sense of all this insanity. I just hope someone clever gets to work on the problem.

As stated in the article, of course there are many more reasons to indulge in war, especially for a country like the US. I would like to contribute with just one, because I live in one of a number of countries that will have to live with the consequences for many centuries after the "official" hostilities have ended.
Welcome to the issue of depleted uranium. Nuclear waste (e.g. from nuclear disarmament) can only be degraded to a certain point. The indestructable residue, such as depleted uranium, has to be containerized and transported at enormous cost, both in terms of money and designated condemned land.
It makes so much more economic sense to just send the stuff off to faraway countries in the form of military ordinance and munitions. All that needs doing is to demomize selected target countries, and such war crimes become not only acceptable, but also desirable.
The quantities of depleted uranium generated in nuclear armed countries is enourmous, and obviously require perpetual wars for their didposal, with no mushroom clouds to cause unecessary alarm and dissapproval.

Try this on: it's immensely profitable. The US spends more on arms than the rest of the world combined, and exports more arms than the rest of the world combined. Soon, probably 60% of our discretionary budget.

We are so dysfunctional at home we have a duty to spread it around the rest of the world... addicted to war in all our domestic institutions we have to do it as an international form of spreadin gour love of weapons to them and their loved ones as well... it is what we come out of WWII with the SuperMan Complex but even superman was a bumbling sort of ovezealous police state of a man... the thing is we believe our Hollywood war propaganda way too much and the false profit of war.

Is America addicted to war? Is a Bengal Tiger, free to roam its home ecology, addicted to aggression?

There is a universal dialectic in history, but not the one you think. This dialectic does not shift between the proletarian centralization of production versus the bourgeois monopoly of surplus wealth. Mere clerical details and bean counter quibbling. No, the universal dialectic is and has always been between guns and butter. What you dismiss so airily in your article and I fear would dismiss as follows.

What do you want? A free, argumentative and well-educated population benefiting from the very best infrastructure, justice system, culture and public health possible (very vulnerable militarily)? Or do you want – in the sacred name of National Security – to optimize the following formula: (body count times distance) over time squared? Ultimately, that weapon formula calls for an enslaved, gagged and narrow-minded population whose infrastructure, justice, etc. systems are expendable trade-offs at best – either direct casualties of strategic warfare or cumulatively sacrificed to weapon priorities. See the USA, circa 2011. The two elements of this dialectic: peace mentality/technology/mythology and weapon m/t/m, are each self-reinforcing but mutually contradictory and antinomial.

Oil and water. Cats and dogs. Affluent and affable vulnerability versus lean and hungry Nazism. Pick one, but be careful what you choose.

Historical civilization can be resumed as five thousand years of Darwinian selection in favor of weapons nations that destroyed and replaced any peaceful equivalents, as well as less-developed weapon nations. We, as individuals, and the United States, as a nation, are the ultimate evolutionary output of this historic arms race. Congratulations! We have optimized the weapon formula: nukes, biological warfare and all our exquisite weapon technologies and crypto-militarist social systems.

Check it out: (body count x distance) / time squared. We rock!

The last major paroxysm of this permanent global arms race was the destruction of National Socialism and its international proxies by the alliance of National Communism and National Capitalism. Followed by the expiration of No. 2 in favor of No. 3, which is presently collapsing from identical internal contradictions, since the only goal of all three has always been the optimization of the weapon formula, at the expense and to the cumulative destruction of every material good and every social value of peace.

That is what “antinomial” means: mutually destructive, inimical and contradictory on every dimension.

As part of your mandatory weapon indoctrination (as universal and subliminal as potty training – we’re talking the end-result of four thousand years of cultural conditioning) you have been programmed to pay lip service to peace (guaranteed fruitlessly), to worship weapons in secret (subliminally potent), and to dismiss any attempt to study this dialectic objectively (ritual stupidity).

What’s more, Western Civilization is hair-trigger-rigged against World Peace. For the first time in history, we dispose of all the communications systems, mutual recognition and will to peace that every prior society lacked (making peace a hollow and deadly joke for them, as well as for us – see what follows). But if the meme virus of peace ever makes use of these newfound tools to spread throughout global populations and inspire them to dismantle weapon equivalents across the planet and institute an Era of World Peace, that revolution will be labeled “the reign of the Antichrist” and resisted to the death by fundamentalist Christianity and Islam combined. Checkmate. Pick your favorite mass extinction event.

We have met Tolkien’s Orcs in the real world, and they are us. Now tell me, good and faithful friend, is America addicted to war?

if one studies and pays close attention to the history of the world and america's place in it, one can easily see the trend towards america's constant involvement in war-like activities and why. it's not just us. although independence was likely attainable, it was made easier through france's assistance; mainly due to france being at war with england and anything that hurt eng. helped france. war was the way of the industrialized world; for whatever reason---mostly the aquisition of more power for power's sake cloaked in the cloak of securing a more secure nation-state. at the turn of the 20th century america tried the isolationist route---it didnt work out. drawn into wwI by germany and wwII by japan; korea and vietnam by the fear of the spread of communism (russian/chinese powere); and recently the m.e. by the fear of terrorist nation-states; we find ourselves faced with 2 distinct choices---withdraw from the international community and wait to be attacked or proactively induce democracy wherever the opportunity provides. the former has proven the poorer of the two choices. the latter (as much as any sane human being abhors war) has shown itself to slowly but surely leading to a world of nation-states in which the process of the people choosing their leaders/government means peace with those nation-states. maybe in my lifetime (and i pray in my children's) power competition will be economic and the need for a military will be purely for the defense of each sovereign nation-states universally recognized borders; but until such a utopian time exists, i feel individuals enjoying the freedom of democracy are obligated toward providing said freedom's at every available opportunity through whatever means necessary. although there is no doubt peaceful mediation is preferred: "some people, you just cant reason with." ghadafi could have stepped down---after tunisia and egypt it should have been obvious international support was there for passive regime change; and that after the taliban and hussein declined to step down what the international response would be.
never forget: americans who supported declaring war on germany in 1937 were considered war-hawks.

"Although everyone recognizes that Qaddafi is a brutal ruler, his forces did not conduct deliberate, large-scale massacres in any of the cities he has recaptured, and his violent threats to wreak vengeance on Benghazi were directed at those who continued to resist his rule, not at innocent bystanders. "

What do you mean by this?
The people who opposed to a brutal ruler and fight for their freedom and rights are not eligible to be protected?? and you call them "not at innocent"???
How many people are killed can be defined as "large-scale" massacres???
Your tone is ridiculous!

If US is strong enough to fight a war for the sake of the responsibility to protect (R2P), even it is not within US border and mostly "on behalf of other people", why not?? If you have this power, you should take the responsiblity and you should protect!!!!!!

All the best to all of the US servicemen.

Speculation on whether America is addicted to war is meaningless since America is exactly and only what Americans collectively think it is. Only by stepping outside your status as an American can you take an objective view but then you must presumably construct and apply your own, or borrow another’s, set of beliefs and values because the notion that that US values are universal is patently not true; there are similarities with other peoples’ values, of course, but they are not one and the same.

The occasions when what is uttered by individuals, or spokespersons representing nations etc., actually corresponds to their actions are rare enough to qualify as accidental, and the invocation of humanitarian notions to justify action or inaction is a mantra as fanciful as invoking Jehovah or Christ. There never was a right or wrong thing to do with regard to Afghanistan, Iraq or Libya and to imagine there might have been is to confuse morality, which is the laws and institutions of the country in which one lives, with wisdom, which is a post eventum judgement.

The perfectly valid question whether the US tends to dispense too much substance on military adventures is better answered by simple consideration of the balance sheet than speculations drawn from psychotherapy.

> the Libyan crusade

Unfortunate choice of adjective - or is it deliberate? Calling US action a crusade tends to allow people with limited education and narrow world-views (or is that the singular) to view it in terms of the enemies of God acting against the chosen people of God, and thus all infidels must be killed, and cannot possibly be nice people.

> am not saying that the AVF is a bad idea that should be chucked, as there are a number of good arguments in its favor

One of them being personal liberty, perhaps? Did not imagine that a Western intellectual would couch an opinion in such terms.

> I've no doubt that one could add more items to this list (e.g., the passive press, the military-industrial complex, etc.),.....

Then why are they not added? The stipulated reason ("but the items already noted go a long way to explaining...") is not acceptable. A little ironic that one of them is "a passive press" - can it be that the press does not wish to take on other parts of the press? The famed "military-industrial" complex? Do you reckon that this complex might pay journalists not to delve too deeply into their operations?

No, it is not necessary. The world will quieten down, or not, in its own good time.

it's interesting that the his-story of this country was santitized and the lil matter of kidnap & enslavement for 250+ years of africans was left out of your article. This country was founded on violence and as a british colony was also a penal colony--british undesirables and prisoners were offered a one way ticket to the 'new world' in exchange for their freedom. The moral compass for this nation was broken from the beginning. Didn't have a chance.

That'd be a "yes."

There is something so pure about academic arrogance. It is self-importance in its most base, inconsequential form - a distillation of 'better-than-thou' untainted by responsibility, religion or ethics. It is a deep inhalation of the still Olympian air of intellectual indifference; a wholesale, relaxed indifference to consequences resulting from wrongness, a prideful indifference only concealable in the vast vacuous halls of the secular vatican that is Academia.

Cardinal Walt continues his most able service to the dogma, never quite aware that his greatest fear has long occurred, never aware that he isn't leading the crusade, never aware that he is perfectly, irrevocably, harmless.

It started as long ago as the death of Jack Kennedy, in 1963. Once he had been so tragically assassinated by Oswald, Israel stepped up its covert plans to build a secret nuclear weapons facility in the Negev desert.

Fast-forward nearly 50 years, and Israel is now estimated to be the 4th most powerful nuclear-armed state on the planet - thanks to the covert collusion of successive US administrations in a political scam known as 'nuclear ambiguity'.

Only now the American government has lost control of the situation and the balance of power has shifted. The consequence is that the US has now no option but to fund a plethora of foreign regimes, dictatorships and failed states - such as Egypt, Iraq and Pakistan in order to satisfy those with vested interests in oil and weapons of mass destruction.

America has lost the war, and the plot, and must send its troops to wherever they are demanded. The end game is becoming apparent.

This topic seems to have degenerated into the aimless and wandering meanderings of the new lost generations.

65 comments within 48 hours of the original article appearing have left the field to those who make commentary that is unfocused, didactic, unthemed and frankly speaking vacuous.

If you are a hammer, everything looks like a nail, and the U.S, military is the biggest hammer. When I lived in New York one of that city's agencies had one function: to dam up valleys upstate for increasing the city's water supply. What did they do? What they were hired to do. As soon as one valley had been dammed up, they started damming up another. Yes, the military/industrial/congressional complex plays a big role, especially with military projects spread to as many congressional districts as possible. When John Stockwell was about to resign in disgust from the CIA he was offered a promotion to a rank equivalent to an army major general, with a seat on the NSA. He accepted, figuring this was his chance to see the big picture. What was the big picture: The CIA's role is to keep as much of the world as possible destabilized so as to maximize the market for the U.S. arms industry. You can get some insight into this from the documentary film Why We Fight. Killing alleged enemies makes money for the fat cats. I don't hate capitalism, but I'm fed up with the kind of capitalism that sees every living thing as something to trash for money, and you and I are among those living things. The people we (collectively) kill are ordinary human beings just like us. Read The Man He Killed, by Thomas Hardy. Read Mark Twain's The Private History of a Campaign That Failed. Forcing the people who make war to fight in those wars would quickly reduce the temptation to wage wars.

http://www.addictedtowar.com/book.html

@ANCIENTWISDOM

"The CIA's role is to keep as much of the world as possible destabilized so as to maximize the market for the U.S. arms industry."

Absolutely! And who owns that industry? Who benefits directly and indirectly?

I am not an American and as others around the world, I too think Americans didn't do their homework right before invading Iraq. However I disagree with the author when he calls Libya a crusade. Infact, supporting Libya is the only sensible thing Americans have done in a while now.

Obama made sure that the mistakes were not repeated by waiting for the UN resolution and that the europeans(who were yelling on Gadaffi the most) were equally involved & they dont chicken out in the middle.

I don't think so, but I believe America is cleverly & constantly egged into it by deviously wise "partners" deeply interested in gains of all kind but not wanting to shoulder the blames of how they are acquired, so they push it on America's well conditioned & receptively convenient back.

Wake Up America

I think it's not so much a question of America being addicted to war, most seem to be absolutely sick of the idea. I think it's really a case of perception: the American public has been 'managed' by the US government into paying the costs of war in human lives, tax dollars, etc. while there's another class that reaps enormous financial benefits. Another 'perception management' operation is that it makes some sort of difference who is elected to the presidency. The overwhelming evidence is that in the long run, it doesn't matter one whit. Eisenhour issued the warning at the end of his term in office. Americans, perhaps too exhausted or frightened to really listen to his sage advice and take back the reigns of Democracy back from the Military/Industrial complex (now the Military/Industrial/Banking/Security State complex) are now reaping the whirlwind. Since the Security Agencies can operate illegally without valid oversight and then claim 'National Security' is at stake when an investigation actually does get too close that threatens to expose what they've done, then they resort to murder and all the issues fade to black.

http://2ndcreation.blogspot.com/2011/03/wadayra-ka-baita.html, this piece was written with our perspective, and with changing perception about US in our world...

The US Constitution, the first eight amendments especially, read very differently from any other constitution whether written or not. The First Amendment reads almost uniquely among constitutions or the "basic law" of that or another country. The United States consequently has found itself at odds with a lot of Old World societies, cultures, traditions, customs, values, mores. Saddam is not the kind of guy hospitable towards the United States, the same was true of Hitler and the same is true of bin Laden to name a few. The CCP fascists in Beijing with their CCP-State-Corporate-Military Complex are certain the United States is a flash in the pan of history.

The United States merely by its existence over the past 222+ years (March 4th 1789 the new USA Government met for the first time) creates enemies beginning with the Bourbon kings of France and Britian's King George III to most recently _________________________ (fill in the blank space, which I deliberately abbreviated by 4000 space ticks on my keyboard).

Afghanistan is a direct reaction to September 11, 2001 and Iraq is an overreaction to it. The Korean Conflict (1950-53) and the Vietnam Era (1965-75) were creatures of the Cold War. The Soviet Union and its war machine had its own Afghanistan (I think ours is a much better cause and lesson).

Pres Eisenhower's farewell speech originally referred to the "Congresional-Military-Industrial Complex" but aides persuaded Ike to leave Congress out of it lest democracy itself seem corrupted. Ike was right and the fact he'd been a general who won the biggest war ever (on the European side of it) gives him specific authority and credibility to identify Congress as a culprit/perp.

However, we could have continued WW2 against the Soviet Russians, as Gen Patton had demanded, or end the fighting war in favor of a nerve wracking Cold War. We chose the latter which created cause of great concern to Ike. Well the USSR finally collapsed of its own dead weight but along came al Qaeda which gave Bush "the war president" the unmissed opportunity to resurrect Ike's foremost issue, i.e., the institutionalized war machine.

Pres Obama is keeping things in this respect under control. Pres Obama and Sec Gates have cut the Pentagon's budget radically and extensively. We're getting out of Iraq, we have a time limited mission in Afghanistan; we've joined in a restrained involvement with our allies and the Arab League in Lybia. This is the natural and normal consequence to the United States of consciously being the United States of America.

The author by focusing on the big picture (history, ideology, structure, etc.) omits the evolving international discussion around the duty to protect. Formed in the aftermath of Rwarda, Bosnia, etc. the question the international community has been grappling with is how to prevent the gruesome massacre of civilian populations in the face of brutal dictators.

What the Obama administration has done is participate in this discussion - something the unilateralist Bush Administration was incapable of doing or at least incapable of talking to anyone beyond puppets and shadows.

This is a "new" venture and with anything of its sort may well be a matter of trial and error.

The other issue pro-miliarists must grapple with is why the "duty to protect" is most likely invoked when economic interests are at stake (Europe's dependence on Libyan oil in this case) but not in other situations like Darfur for example.

Good article and good to see so many responses that support the article. With the great game and the need to secure energy rich points along with supporting the big military industry, yes america seems to be in power simply because its the only world power. But the question is do all american's favour war or like any third world country the citizens are hostage to few manics!

This is not rocket science and we do not need superior-qualified professors of Harvard to intellectualise what the US has been doing for the last 100 years.

The correct question, Professor, is 'Is the World Addicted to Producing Aggressive Undemocratic Tyrant Leaders?'

To which the answer i unequivocally 'Yes'.

The USA dealt with Hitler. The USA dealt with Russia. It tried to deal with communist tyranny in South East Asia. It tried the same in Korea. Did George Bush make absolutely certain Saddam Hussein could not filter WMD to violent extremists who would use them against USA and the West ? Damned right he did (the fact that there were no stockpiles of WMD is not really relevant to the decision to invade, and in any event Saddam possessed 'dual use' facilities which could convert to a WMD programme at the flick of a switch - unless you think Donal Rumsfeld lied in his book 'Known and Unknown'?),

All you liberal United States citizens should get a grip and understand what is going on in the world. The New Hitler is busily building nuclear weapons and enriching uranium in Natanz (Iran, if you hadn't worked it out), ready to be used on you. Yes YOU.

Socialist Obama's diplomatic appeasement efforts with this country has been a disaster. The New Hitler is just laughing at the US as it continues to prepare and develop its nuclear devices.

Unless this man Ahmadinejad is stopped he WILL use nuclear weapons, he WILL plan simultaneous nuclear explosions in Tel Aviv, Washington and London. All parts smuggled into those countries courtesy of Al Quaeda and their affilliates, no delivery system required.

So is America 'addicted to war?' Yes, by necessity it is - because it is a beacon of hope for freedom and democracy and it is a christian superpower which polices the world. It has been obliged to act when not only its interests but the wider interests of freedom and democracy have been threatened.

I frankly do not relish the prospect of a world without the US World Police. But maybe you US liberals can repent at leisure when you see the smoking ruins of your capital city, Tel Aviv, and the new world order in which you will have no say.

The world is in fact addicted to tyrants and other traditions of dictators and dictatorship. The worst terminal addict is China with its new reactionary dictatorship of CCP censoring fascist jailers in Beijing who just love China's 5000 year old tradition of emperors, except that the CCP latter day emperors get to wear $5000 business suits, silk ties and slick looking shoes.

The United States is playing a supporting role in the Lybian operation. Leading it is the Arab League and executing it is Europe's most modern and sophisticated fighter aircraft (as noted elsewhere in FP) and a couple of dozen fighter jets from ME countries. The constitution of the United States, especially the Bill of Rights and its First Amendment make it the target of every dictator and tyrant but especially those who love repeatedly to shout "Crusader!"

Nobody in the rest of the world wants U.S. 'splendid isolation'.

A good deal of 'splendid introspection' will do fine, though, and these ideas of Walt's are a good place to start.

Usually it is only outside of the U.S. that the structural reasons for that country's foreign policy decisions can be as clearly viewed as in this article.

I'd say a good part of that money spent on the projection of U.S. military force would go a long way domestically.

Combine that with more sober assessments of when and where to intervene militarily, and there'd probably be a positive effect on the way the rest of the world views the U.S.

A lot of people in the U.S. don't seem to like the current trend of continued reduction to its prestige, so what's wrong with listening a few good ideas? What Walt advocates might turn things around for you.

Regards.

Obama has joined the "Chicago boys" school of foreign policy.

Shame! Shame! Shame!

Obama and Hilary Clinton, why don't they organise intervention in D R Congo based on UN resolution 1888? I'm sure it's prime territory for the disaster capitalism complex. Indications are it's in the pipeline for the above mentioned school.

A Democrat president who is a Democrat at home but a corporatist abroad.

Addicted to war, yes, but only the most profitable wars.

http://vimeo.com/8196190 PLEASE LOOK THIS VIDEO AND U LL SEE WHAT S AMERICA AND WHAT PPL WHO RULE THE WORLD ARE CAPABLE TO DO,WHAT THEY HAVE DONE IN PAST AND WHAT THEY ARE PLANING TO DO,PLEEEEEEEEEEEASE U HAVE TO SEE THIS,IT LL CHANGE YOUR LIFE LIKE IT CHANGED MINE

My own inclination is to place the influence of the Military-Industrial complex at the top f the list; especially in light of the fact that manufacturing is spread through-out the United States; thus having tremendous influence over political campaigns due to the economic impact. This is accompanied by the 'revolving door' in which individuals shift between stints in influential senior government positions and then lobbyists for the defense industry.

My own inclination is to place the influence of the Military-Industrial complex at the top f the list; especially in light of the fact that manufacturing is spread through-out the United States; thus having tremendous influence over political campaigns due to the economic impact. This is accompanied by the 'revolving door' in which individuals shift between stints in influential senior government positions and then lobbyists for the defense industry.

Just missed two important reasons.

6th: The media is conservative and show partial facts. It usually tows the government line on war and supports the war.

7th: The general public in USA is unaware of the happenings around the world and can thus is easily fooled by the government. Iraq's WMD capabilities is just one example. While the Palestinian holocaust has remained acceptable for the American public the Qaddafi killing just moved the NATO and USA within few weeks.

Hypocrisy and Double standards. I don't know for how long US government will keep fooling the dumb citizens.

Shams Zaman - Pakistan.

Yet a mere two years later, we find ourselves back in the fray once again. Since taking office, Obama has escalated U.S. involvement in Afghanistan and launched a new war against Libya. As in Iraq, the real purpose of our intervention is regime change at the maxsikis point of a gun. At first we hoped that most of the guns would be in the hands of the Europeans, or the hands of the rebel forces arrayed against Muammar al-Qaddafi, but it's increasingly video clear that U.S. military forces, CIA operatives and foreign weapons supplies are going to be necessary to finish the job.

Yet a mere two years later, we find ourselves back in the fray once again. Since taking office, Obama has escalated U.S. involvement in Afghanistan and launched a new war against Libya. As in Iraq, the real purpose of our intervention is regime change at the enguzel point of a gun. At first we hoped that most of the guns would be in the hands of the Europeans, or the hands of the rebel forces arrayed against Muammar al-Qaddafi, but it's increasingly video clear that U.S. military forces, CIA operatives and foreign weapons supplies are going to be necessary to finish the job.