Published on Alternet (http://www.alternet.org)
Sorry, the
Idea that Civilians Control the US Military Is Pure Fantasy
March 18, 2016
Item [3]: Two
U.S. Navy patrol boats, with 10 sailors aboard, “stray” into Iranian
territorial waters, and are apprehended and held by Iranian revolutionary
guards, precipitating a 24-hour international incident involving negotiations
at the highest levels of government to secure their release. The Pentagon
offers conflicting reports on why this happened: navigational error, mechanical
breakdown, fuel depletion -- but not intelligence-gathering, intentional
provocation, or hormonally induced hot-dogging.
Item [4]: The
Pentagon, according to a Reuters exposé, has been consciously and
systematically engaged in thwarting White House efforts to close the Guantanamo
Bay detention facility and release cleared detainees. Pentagon officials have
repeatedly refused to provide basic documentation to foreign governments
willing to take those detainees and have made it increasingly difficult for
foreign delegations to visit Guantanamo to assess them. Ninety-one of the 779 detainees [5] held
there over the years remain, 34 of whom have been cleared for release.
Item [6]: The
Pentagon elects not to reduce General David Petraeus in rank, thereby ensuring
that he receives full, four-star retirement pay, after previously being
sentenced on misdemeanor charges to two years’ probation and a $100,000 fine
for illegally passing highly classified material (a criminal offense) to his
mistress (adultery, ordinarily punishable under the Uniform Code of Military
Justice) and lying to FBI officials (a criminal offense). Meanwhile, Private
Chelsea (née Bradley) Manning [7] continues to serve a
35-year prison sentence, having been reduced to the Army’s lowest rank and
given a dishonorable discharge for providing classified documents to WikiLeaks
that included incriminating on-board videos of a 2007 Apache helicopter attack [8] in
Baghdad that killed up to 18 civilians, including two Reuters journalists, and
wounded two children, and of a 2009 massacre [9] in
Afghanistan in which a B-1 bomber killed as many as 147 civilians, reportedly
including some 93 children.
What do
these episodes have in common? In their own way, they’re all symptomatic of an
enduring crisis in civil-military relations that afflicts the United States.
Hyperbolic
though it may sound, it is a crisis, though not like the Flint
water crisis, or the international refugee crisis, or the ISIS crisis, or the
Zika crisis. It’s more like the climate crisis, or a lymphoma or termite
infestation that destroys from within, unrecognized and unattended. And
yes, it’s an enduring crisis, a state of affairs that has been with us,
unbeknownst to the public and barely acknowledged by purported experts on the
subject of civil-military relations, for the past two decades or more.
The essence
of the situation begins, but doesn’t end, with civilian control of the
military, where direction, oversight, and final decision-making authority reside
with duly elected and appointed civil officials. That’s a minimalist
precondition for democracy. A more ideal version of the relationship would be
civilian supremacy, where there is civically engaged public oversight of
strategically competent legislative oversight of strategically competent
executive oversight of a willingly accountable, self-policing military.
What we
have today, instead, is the polar opposite: not civilian supremacy over, nor
even civilian control of the military, but what could be characterized as
civilian subjugation to the military, where civilian officials are largely
militarily illiterate, more militaristic than the military itself, advocates
for -- rather than overseers of -- the institution, and running scared
politically (lest they be labeled weak on defense and security).
That, then,
is our lot today. Civilian authorities are almost unequivocally deferential to
established military preferences, practices, and ways of thinking. The
military itself, as the three “items” above suggest, sets its own standards,
makes and produces its own news, and appropriates policy and policymaking for
its own ends, whatever civilian leadership may think or want. It is a
demonstrably massive, self-propelled institution increasingly central to American
life, and what it says and wants and does matters in striking ways. We would do
well to consider the many faces of civil-military relations today, especially
in light of the role the military has arrogated to itself.
A Crisis
Appears and Disappears
University
of North Carolina historian Richard Kohn raised the specter of a civil-military
crisis in a 1994 National Interest article [10] titled
“Out of Control: The Crisis in Civil-Military Relations.” He focused on the
ill-disguised disdain of many in uniform for Commander-in-Chief Bill Clinton,
highlighting the particularly politicized behavior of Joint Chiefs of Staff
Chairman Colin Powell, who had spoken out in opposition to two prime items on
the Clinton agenda: intervention in the Balkans and gays in the military.
Typical of how the bounds of propriety had been crossed, Kohn also alluded to
the example of the Air Force major general [11] who,
at a military gathering, contemptuously characterized the president as
“gay-loving,” “pot-smoking,” “draft-dodging,” and “womanizing.”
Too
alarmist for many pundits, Kohn’s claim of a growing crisis gave way to the
milder thought, advocated most forcefully by journalist Tom Ricks [12], that
there was simply an increasing cultural, experiential, and ideological “gap”
between the military and society, a thesis that itself then went dormant when
George W. Bush entered office.
Those who
profess expertise on civil-military relations have tended to focus almost
exclusively on civilian control and the associated issue of the military’s
political “neutrality.” That’s why so much attention and controversy were
generated over President Obama’s highly publicized firing of General Stanley
McChrystal for the climate he created that led to the disparagement of senior
Obama officials by his subordinates (as reported in the 2010 Rolling
Stone article [13] “The
Runaway General”). Yet far bigger and more fundamental matters have gone
largely unnoticed.
Civil-military
relations are built on a tacit but binding social contract of mutual rights,
obligations, and expectations among the military, its civilian overseers
(executive and legislative), and society. Four things are expected of the
military as part of this compact: operational competence, sound advice,
political neutrality, and social responsibility. Operational competence and
social responsibility are rarely even part of the discussion and yet they go to
the heart of the crisis that exists, pointing both to the outsized presence of
the military in American life and statecraft, and to a disturbingly pervasive
pattern of misconduct over time among those in uniform.
The Failure
of Operational Competence
If we
enjoyed a truly healthy state of civil-military relations, it would be
characterized by a strategically -- not just a militarily -- effective force.
By implication, such a military would be capable of successfully accomplishing
whatever it is called upon to do. The military we have today is, arguably,
ineffective not only militarily but demonstrably strategically as well. It
doesn’t prevent wars; it doesn’t win wars; and it certainly doesn’t secure and
preserve the peace.
No, the
military doesn’t prevent wars. At any given time over the past quarter century,
on average roughly 40 violent conflicts a year [14] have
been underway around the world. The U.S. military has had virtually no
discernible influence on lessening the outbreak of such conflicts. It isn’t
even clear that its size, configuration, and positioning, no less the
staggering sums invested in it, have had any appreciable deterrent effect on
the warring propensities of our so-called peer competitors (Russia and China).
That they have not sought war with us is due far less to simplistic Washington
assumptions about deterrence than to factors we don’t even grasp.
And no, the
military doesn’t win wars anymore. It hasn’t won one of note in 70 years. The
dirty wars in the shadows it now regularly fights are intrinsically unwinnable,
especially given our preferred American Way of War: killing people and breaking
things as lethally, destructively, and overwhelmingly as possible. It’s an
approach -- a state of mind -- still largely geared to a different type of
conflict from an era now long since past and to those classic generals who are
always preparing for the last war. That’s why today’s principal adversaries
have been so uniformly effective in employing asymmetric methods as a form of
strategic jujitsu to turn our presumed strengths into crippling weaknesses.
Instead of
a strategically effective military, what we have is quite the opposite: heavy,
disproportionately destructive, indiscriminately lethal, single-mindedly
combat-oriented, technology-dominant, exorbitantly expensive, unsustainably
consumptive, and increasingly alienated from the rest of society. Just as
important, wherever it goes, it provokes and antagonizes where it should
reassure and thereby invariably fathers the mirror image of itself in others.
Not
surprisingly, the military today doesn’t secure and preserve peace, a concept
no longer evident in Washington’s store of know-how. Those in uniform and in
positions of civilian authority who employ the military subscribe almost
universally and uncritically to the inherently illogical maxim that if you want
peace, you had best prepare for war. The result is that the force being
prepared (even engorged) feeds and nurtures pervasive militarism -- the primacy
of, preference for, and deference to military solutions in the conduct of
statecraft. Where it should provide security, it instead produces only
self-defeating insecurity.
Consider
just five key areas where military preferences override civilian ones and
accentuate all manner of insecurity in the process.
Rapacious
defense spending: The U.S. military budget exceeds that of
the next 10 countries [15] combined,
as well as of the gross domestic products of all but 20 countries [16]. At 54% of
federal discretionary spending, it surpasses all other discretionary accounts
combined, including government, education, Medicare, veterans’ benefits,
housing, international affairs, energy and the environment, transportation, and
agriculture. Thanks to the calculations of the National Priorities Project [17], we know
that the total cost of American war since 2001 -- $1.6 trillion -- would have
gotten us 19.5 million Head Start slots for 10 years or paid for 2.2 million
elementary school teachers for a decade. A mere 1% of the defense budget for
one year -- just over $5 billion -- would pay for 152,000 four-year university
scholarships or 6,342 police officers for 10 years. What we spend on nuclear
weapons alone each year -- $19.3 billion -- would cover a decade of low-income
healthcare for 825,000 children or 549,000 adults.
Promiscuous
arms sales: The United States remains by far the world’s leading
proliferator of conventional arms, accounting [18] for
some 50% of all global sales and 48% of all sales to the developing world.
During the 2011-2014 period alone, U.S. weapons deliveries included a wide
array of advanced weapons technologies: 104 tanks and self-propelled guns, 230
artillery pieces, 419 armored personnel vehicles, 48 supersonic aircraft and 58
other aircraft, 835 surface-to-air missiles, and 144 anti-ship missiles, much
of that to the volatile Middle East. Skeptics would say that such transactions
are motivated less by an urge to enable recipient countries to defend themselves
than by the desire to buy influence abroad while aiding and abetting arms
manufacturers at home. The result of such massive sales is, of course, the
creation of yet more instability where stability should be.
Garrisoning
the planet: The military maintains up to 800 bases [19] in
more than 70 countries and stations more than 200,000 active-duty personnel [20] in
some 150 countries. This global presence represents the geostrategic equivalent
of Parkinson’s law: operational and social entanglements expanding
exponentially to fill the space created by these far-flung outposts.
The nuclear
black hole: The military remains the permanent keeper and executor of
the world’s largest nuclear arsenal [21]: an
estimated 4,700 nuclear warheads on some 800 delivery systems, as well as
another 2,340 “retired” but still intact and presumably usable warheads. A
three-decade, trillion-dollar upgrade [22] of
this already monstrous arsenal is now underway. The Economist has called [23] this
Washington’s “unkicked addiction.” It should be clear, but apparently isn’t,
that these are weapons of disuse. Other than for destroying the planet if used,
their only value is as a measure of muscularity against mirror-image peers.
They deter nothing at other levels of muscle-flexing but do feed an insatiable
thirst for emulation among jealous non-possessors of such weaponry.
Spurning
the rule of law: Though the U.S. regularly espouses and pretends to practice
the rule of law, administration after administration has chosen to forswear
important international agreements [24] for
parochial, largely military reasons. Among those not even signed are the 1969
Convention on the Non-Applicability of Statutory Limitations to War Crimes and
Crimes Against Humanity, the 1997 Ottawa Mine Ban Treaty, the 2002 Optional
Protocol to the Convention Against Torture, the 2006 International Convention
for the Protection of All Persons from Enforced Disappearance, and the 2008
Convention on Cluster Munitions. Among those Washington has signed but not
ratified are the 1977 Protocols I and II to the Geneva Conventions, the 1994
Convention on the Safety of United Nations and Associated Personnel, the 1996
Comprehensive Nuclear Test Ban Treaty, the 1997 Kyoto Protocol, and the 1998
Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court. Add to this list the 1972
Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty, ratified in 1972, from which the U.S. withdrew
in 2002. Then there are agreements to which the U.S. is a party, but which we
nonetheless choose to ignore or circumvent, wholly or in part. These include
the 1928 Kellogg-Briand General Treaty [25] for
Renunciation of War as an Instrument of National Policy; the 1968 Treaty on the
Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons (Article VI [26] of
which states: “Each of the Parties to the Treaty undertakes to pursue
negotiations in good faith on effective measures relating to cessation of the
nuclear arms race at an early date and to nuclear disarmament, and on a treaty
on general and complete disarmament under strict and effective international
control”); and the United Nations Convention against Torture [27] and
selected provisions of the Geneva Conventions [28]. (We don’t
do prisoners of war; we do “unlawful enemy combatants.” We don’t do torture; we
do “enhanced interrogation.” And of course we don’t engage in other
illegalities, like “extraordinary rendition” or targeted killing or the use of
black sites where hostile parties can be disappeared.)
Militarizing
America’s World -- At Home and Abroad
Added to
the foregoing excesses are many examples of what we might call organizational
hypertrophy. Institutions like the military are, by nature, self-selecting,
self-fulfilling, self-perpetuating constellations of values and practices that
generate their own realities and can rarely be disestablished once born. As at
Hotel California, you can check out any time you like, but you can never leave.
Of
particular note in the post-9/11 world is our bloated intelligence apparatus
of 16 separate agencies [29], nine of
which are military organizations (if you count Coast Guard Intelligence). Most
notably, there is the National Security Agency (NSA), always commanded by a
general or admiral who now also heads up the U.S. Cyber Command. NSA’s massive
surveillance culture and capabilities foreshadow a totalizing new-age cyber
warfare regime guaranteed to completely redefine traditional notions of
aggression, self-defense, sovereignty, and territorial integrity in
hair-trigger terms.
The
military itself has nine combatant commands [30], six of
which are regional and divvy up the planet accordingly. Except for NATO, there
are no regional ambassadors, so the face we show to the world, region by
region, is military -- and combatant -- not diplomatic. Even the “homeland” now
has its own combatant command, the U.S. Northern Command. In tandem with the
“civilian” Department of Homeland Security, it has produced the militarization
of the domestic front, dispensed with historical border sensitivities vis-à-vis
Canada and Mexico, magnified concerns about civil liberties, and fed a
permanent state of paranoia and alarm among the public about both illegal
immigration and terrorism.
Special
attention also must be given to the massive expansion of U.S. Special
Operations Command, once a modest cohort of elite specialists, into a force now
larger than the militaries of many countries. Its ostensible raison
d'être is waging permanent “war” against terrorism. The growing
presence of and preference for using special operations forces [31] globally
ought to command the attention of anyone concerned with civil-military
relations. Each armed service has a special operations command, as does each
combatant command, including Northern Command. Estimates [32] are
that special operations personnel already number [33] or
are expected [34] to
number around 70,000 (roughly the equivalent of four and a half Army
divisions). This provides an almost infinite amount of potential space for
meddling and “mission creep” abroad and at home due, in part, to the
increasingly blurred lines between military, intelligence, police, and internal
security functions.
Of the
various ways the military could be configured -- for warfighting; peacekeeping,
nation-building, humanitarian assistance, and disaster response; or covert
special operations -- the last poses by far the greatest threat to effective
civilian control of the military. An increasing reliance on and reverence for
Special Operations forces (SOFs) only exacerbates already existing civilian
deference to military preferences, practices, and mindsets. Conducting a range
of operations, from low-profile assignments unknown to most Americans to secret
missions beyond the bounds of stringent congressional oversight, the very
nature of SOF missions fosters a military culture that is particularly
destructive to accountability and proper lines of responsibility.
Especially in times of divided government, as at present, when working around
Congress is a preferred norm for getting things done, the temptation to employ
forces that can circumvent oversight without objection is almost irresistible.
The Failure
of Social Responsibility
As an
institution, the military is accorded carte blanche authority to possess and
wield violence on behalf of the state. It is also a mammoth social institution
that reaches deep into American society and many other societies worldwide. It
thus is tacitly expected to comport itself in a socially responsible manner and
its members to demonstrate professionalism in their conduct. And yet the
pervasive, long-term misbehavior of those in uniform is striking, even
alarming. This is where civilian subjugation to the military manifests
itself most glaringly, and where the lack of a willingly accountable,
self-policing military comes most clearly into view.
Each year
for at least the past two decades, literally hundreds of incidents have
occurred that undermine any claims the military might make to moral
superiority: atrocities, corruption and bribery, fraud and waste, sexual
misconduct, cover-ups, racial and religious persecution, and acts of cultural
intolerance. Moral arrogance is in abundant supply among those in uniform,
genuine moral superiority in short supply. To cite just a small sample of such
incidents from the recent past:
* The
continuing “Fat Leonard” scandal [35] that
involved an exchange of bribes, gifts, and prostitutes for classified
information on ship movements, implicating at least seven officers and
officials and leading to the censure of three rear admirals.
* The
ongoing Army National Guard recruiting fraud and kickback scandal [36]involving
thousands of soldiers and tens of millions of dollars in illegal payments.
* The four-star former head [37] of
U.S. Africa Command, reduced in rank and forced to pay restitution for lavish
spending of public funds on private business; the three-star former deputy [38] nuclear
force commander who used counterfeit poker chips at a casino; the two-star commander [39] of
the ICBM force who went on a drunken binge and insulted Russian counterparts at
a joint exercise; the one-star commander [40] of
Fort Jackson, South Carolina, relieved of duty for adultery and physically
assaulting his mistress; the one-star assistant division commander [41] of
the “elite” 82nd Airborne Division, fined $20,000 and reduced in rank for
multiple affairs and other sexual misconduct; and the one-star commander [42] of
special operations forces in Latin America, relieved of command and reduced in
rank for drunken altercations.
* The
forced resignation of the under secretary of the Navy [43] over
a scandal in which the brother of a naval intelligence official billed the
military $1.6 million for weapons silencers that cost only $8,000 to manufacture.
* The
proficiency exam cheating scandals [44] that
implicated several dozen Air Force and Navy nuclear weapons personnel.
* The Army staff sergeant [45], sentenced
to life imprisonment for murdering 16 civilians and wounding six others in
Afghanistan.
* The Army staff sergeant [46], also
sentenced to life imprisonment, and five other soldiers who, as part of a
“thrill kill” unit, murdered three Afghan civilians for sport and took their
body parts as trophies.
* The Rolling Stone exposé [47] of
the Special Forces A-Team that allegedly “disappeared” 10 men and murdered
eight others in Afghanistan.
* The
photos of 82nd Airborne Division soldiers posing [49] with
body parts of dead Afghan insurgents.
* The
burning of as many as 100 Korans [50] and
other religious texts by American troops in Afghanistan.
* The
unceasing surfeit of sexual assault reports [51] in
the military (22,000 between 2010 and 2014).
Such
episodes aren’t, of course, only of recent vintage. Walking the calendar back a
few years reminds us of many other similar examples:
* 2011: the
suicides of Marine Lance Corporal Harry Lew [52] and
Army Private Danny Chen [53] after
hazing and harassment by fellow soldiers.
* 2010:
the Khataba raid [54] in
Afghanistan in which Army Rangers killed five civilians, including two pregnant
women and a teenage girl.
* 2009: the
massive sex scandal at Lackland Air Force Base [55], in which
43 female trainees were subjected to sexual predation by instructors.
* 2008:
revelations about a Pentagon military analyst program [56] in
which retired senior officers working as news commentators received special
access to insider briefings and information in return for publicly promoting
Bush administration policies.
* 2007: a
U.S. Naval Academy scandal [57] involving
a Navy doctor secretly videotaping midshipmen engaged in sex acts; a Walter Reed Army Medical Center
scandal [58] involving extensive patient neglect and execrable living
conditions; and revelations concerning massive Iraq War contracting [59] fraud,
bribery, and kickbacks totaling $15 million.
* 2006:
the rape and killing [60] of a
14-year-old girl and the murder of her family by five Army soldiers in
Mahmudiyah, Iraq; the murder [61] of an
Iraqi man in Hamdania, Iraq, with associated kidnapping, obstruction of
justice, and conspiracy, by seven Marines and a Navy corpsman; and the relief
of the USS Enterprise captain [62] for
producing and showing sexually explicit and offensive videos on board.
* 2005: the
massacre of 24 Iraqi men, women and children by Marines in Haditha, Iraq [63], and the
associated cover-up in which all criminal charges were dismissed; and the
Pentagon’s planting [64] of
stories favorable to the war effort in the Iraqi press.
* 2004: the
friendly-fire death of Pat Tillman [65] and
the tragedy’s associated cover-up, extending up the chain of command to the
Pentagon.
* 2003:
massive acts of prisoner sexual abuse, torture, rape, sodomy, and murder by
Army personnel at Abu Ghraib [66] prison
in Iraq.
* 2002: the
deaths of two unarmed civilian Afghan prisoners [67], who had
been chained to the ceiling and beaten by U.S. troops, at the Bagram internment
facility in Afghanistan.
All of this
is but the tiniest tip of the military misbehavior iceberg, a sample of
countless incidents that have regularly occurred over an extended period of
time. Remember the Tailhook [68] sexual
assault scandal, the Aberdeen [69] sex
scandal, the Camp Lejeune [70] water
contamination scandal, the Cavalese cable car [71] disaster,
the firing and reduction in rank of the sergeant major of the Army [72] for
sexual misconduct, the murder of Private First Class Barry Winchell [73], the
discharge of Air Force Lieutenant Kelly Flinn [74]?
Such a
tidal wave of ethical breakdowns can’t be dismissed as mere exceptions to the
rule or deviations from the norm. Institutional defenders nonetheless persist
in claiming that such incidents represent the actions of a few bad apples in an
otherwise healthy cultural barrel. In this, they are simply wrong, yet their
positions are eternally bolstered by the fact that annual opinion polls [75] of
public trust and confidence in society’s institutions invariably place the
military at or near the top of the list.
What Is to
Be Done?
To this
question -- What is to be done? -- there is no easy answer, perhaps no answer
at all. Part of the reason is that the underlying crisis in civil-military
relations has gone largely unrecognized, unacknowledged, and unaddressed for
decades now. A first step, therefore, might simply be to break the bonds of
denial and admit that there is a problem.
A second
step -- admittedly a far march onto an unknown planet -- would be to encourage
serious, thoroughgoing institutional self-reflection from both the military and
civilian authorities. This would, of course, mean facing up to those facets of
military culture that warrant reengineering: aggression, intolerance,
authoritarianism, parochialism, congenital secrecy, and pronounced
anti-intellectualism among them. It would also mean acknowledging the numerous
myths that have come to define the institution over time -- for example, that
the military nurtures and rewards leadership (rather than dutiful
followership); that it instills discipline (rather than indiscipline); that it
exemplifies competence and efficiency (rather than incompetence and
inefficiency); that it is committed to accountability (rather than cover-ups
and secrecy); and that its members, especially at senior levels, regularly
demonstrate moral courage (rather than moral cowardice).
A third
step would involve a concerted educational effort, inside and outside the
institution, to enhance strategic thinking, ethical thinking, and civic
literacy (especially, but not exclusively, among those in uniform).
A fourth
step -- ultimately the most fundamental and paradigm-shattering, as well as the
least likely to occur -- would be to reconsider the very purpose and function
of the military and to reorient it accordingly. That would mean transforming a
cumbersome, stagnant, obsolescent, irrelevant warfighting force -- with its own
inbuilt self-corrupting qualities -- into a peacekeeping, nation-building,
humanitarian-assistance, disaster-response force far more attuned to a future
it helps shape and far more strategically effective than what we now have.
Translated, counterintuitive as it might sound, this would mean seeking to
demilitarize the military, an overarching strategic imperative if bona fide
lasting peace is ever to be achieved on this planet.
Humpty Dumpty [76] posed
the question to Alice in Through the Looking Glass of whether
words are to be the masters of men or men the masters of words by determining
their meaning. Similarly must we ask whether an institution, the military,
supposedly endowed with supernal character by objective circumstances, is to
master us, or we to master it by determining for ourselves what it properly is
and does.
Gregory D.
Foster is a professor at the National Defense University in Washington, D.C., a
West Point graduate, and a decorated veteran of the Vietnam War.
Follow TomDispatch on Twitter [77] and
join us on Facebook [78]. Check out
the newest Dispatch Book, Nick Turse’s Tomorrow’s Battlefield: U.S. Proxy
Wars and Secret Ops in Africa [79], and Tom
Engelhardt's latest book, Shadow Government: Surveillance,
Secret Wars, and a Global Security State in a Single-Superpower World [80].
[82]
Source URL: http://www.alternet.org/civil-liberties/sorry-idea-civilians-control-us-military-pure-fantasy
Links:
[1] http://www.alternet.org/authors/gregory-d-foster
[2] http://www.tomdispatch.com
[3] http://www.military.com/daily-news/2016/01/13/10-sailors-detained-in-iran-returned-to-us-navy.html
[4] http://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-gitmo-release-special-report-idUSKBN0UB1B020151228
[5] http://www.closeguantanamo.org/Prisoners
[6] http://www.military.com/daily-news/2016/01/30/pentagon-tells-senate-it-wont-demote-retired-gen-petraeus.html
[7] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chelsea_Manning
[8] http://www.nytimes.com/2010/04/06/world/middleeast/06baghdad.html
[9] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Granai_airstrike
[10] http://nationalinterest.org/article/out-of-control-the-crisis-in-civil-military-relations-343
[11] http://www.nytimes.com/1993/06/16/us/general-to-be-disciplined-for-disparaging-president.html
[12] http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/1997/07/the-widening-gap-between-military-and-society/306158/
[13] http://www.rollingstone.com/politics/news/the-runaway-general-20100622
[14] http://www.pcr.uu.se/research/ucdp/charts_and_graphs/#region
[15] http://www.globalfirepower.com/defense-spending-budget.asp
[16] http://knoema.com/nwnfkne/world-gdp-ranking-2015-data-and-charts
[17] https://www.nationalpriorities.org/interactive-data/trade-offs/
[18] http://fas.org/sgp/crs/weapons/R44320.pdf
[19] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_United_States_military_bases
[20] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_military_deployments
[21] http://bos.sagepub.com/content/71/2/107.full.pdf+html
[22] http://www.nytimes.com/2014/09/22/us/us-ramping-up-major-renewal-in-nuclear-arms.html
[23] http://www.economist.com/news/briefing/21645840-despite-optimistic-attempts-rid-world-nuclear-weapons-threat-they-pose-peace
[24] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_treaties_unsigned_or_unratified_by_the_United_States
[25] http://www.yale.edu/lawweb/avalon/imt/kbpact.htm
[26] http://www.un.org/en/conf/npt/2005/npttreaty.html
[27] http://www.hrweb.org/legal/cat.html
[28] https://www.icrc.org/en/war-and-law/treaties-customary-law/geneva-conventions
[29] http://www.dni.gov/index.php/intelligence-community/members-of-the-ic
[30] http://fas.org/sgp/crs/natsec/R42077.pdf
[31] http://www.tomdispatch.com/post/176048/tomgram%3A_nick_turse,_a_secret_war_in_135_countries/
[32] http://www.tomdispatch.com/post/175945/tomgram%3A_nick_turse%2C_a_shadow_war_in_150_countries/
[33] http://www.armed-services.senate.gov/imo/media/doc/Votel_07-10-14.pdf
[34] http://archive.defense.gov/pubs/2014_Quadrennial_Defense_Review.pdf
[35] http://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2015/02/10/fat-leonard-bribery-navy/23198913/
[36] http://www.armytimes.com/story/military/crime/2016/01/06/7-more-soldiers-charged-national-guard-recruiting-fraud-conspiracy/78371086/
[37] http://www.nydailynews.com/news/national/general-demoted-extravagant-trips-article-1.1201284
[38] http://www.theguardian.com/world/2013/oct/09/us-nuclear-commander-tim-giardina-fired-amid-gambling-investigation
[39] http://www.nydailynews.com/news/national/air-force-general-michael-carey-fired-epic-drunken-bender-moscow-article-1.1554042
[40] http://usnews.nbcnews.com/_news/2013/05/21/18403871-army-general-suspended-from-duties-amid-adultery-investigation?lite
[41] https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/national-security/disgraced-army-general-jeffrey-a-sinclair-receives-fine-no-jail-time/2014/03/20/c555b650-b039-11e3-95e8-39bef8e9a48b_story.html
[42] http://www.military.com/daily-news/2015/06/04/special-operations-general-lost-command-for-public-drunkenness.html
[43] https://www.rt.com/usa/navy-civilian-ranked-resigns-corruption-668/
[44] http://nypost.com/2014/02/05/exam-cheating-scandal-hits-navy-nuclear-training-school/
[45] http://www.theguardian.com/world/2013/aug/23/afghanistan-massacre-robert-bales-trial
[46] http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/northamerica/usa/8883384/Ringleader-of-US-army-kill-team-sentenced-to-life-for-murder-of-Afghans.html
[47] http://www.rollingstone.com/feature/a-team-killings-afghanistan-special-forces
[48] http://www.theguardian.com/world/2012/sep/24/us-marines-charged-dead-taliban
[49] http://articles.latimes.com/2012/apr/18/nation/la-na-afghan-photos-20120418
[50] http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/asia/afghanistan/9502439/US-troops-burned-100-copies-of-the-Koran-in-Afghanistan.html
[51] http://sapr.mil/public/docs/reports/FY14_Annual/FY14_DoD_SAPRO_Annual_Report_on_Sexual_Assault.pdf
[52] https://themilitarysuicidereport.wordpress.com/tag/harry-lew/
[53] http://articles.latimes.com/2012/jul/30/nation/la-na-nn-danny-chen-suicide-case-verdict-20120730
[54] http://www.rawa.org/temp/runews/2010/04/05/us-special-forces-tried-to-cover-up-botched-khataba-raid-in-afghanistan.html
[55] http://articles.latimes.com/2013/jan/23/nation/la-na-nn-lackland-scandal-hearing-20130123
[56] http://www.salon.com/2008/05/09/cnn_abc/
[57] http://www.cbsnews.com/news/military-trial-begins-in-navy-sex-scandal/
[58] http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/02/17/AR2007021701172.html
[59] http://www.military.com/NewsContent/0,13319,156902,00.html
[60] http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/07/02/AR2006070200673_pf.html
[61] http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=6496916
[62] http://abcnews.go.com/Politics/US/uss-enterprise-commander-capt-owen-honors-popular-successful/story?id=12536216
[63] http://www.cnn.com/2013/10/30/world/meast/haditha-killings-fast-facts/index.html
[64] http://www.boston.com/news/world/middleeast/articles/2005/12/01/us_planting_stories_in_iraqi_newspapers/
[65] http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=112816210
[66] http://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2004/05/10/torture-at-abu-ghraib
[67] http://www.nytimes.com/2005/05/20/world/asia/in-us-report-brutal-details-of-2-afghan-inmates-deaths.html?_r=1
[68] http://www.nytimes.com/2013/05/13/booming/revisiting-the-militarys-tailhook-scandal-video.html
[69] http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/local/longterm/library/aberdeen/caution.htm
[70] http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/01/13/camp-lejeune-water-contamination-navy-letter_n_1203465.html
[71] https://worldhistoryproject.org/1998/2/3/cavalese-cable-car-disaster
[72] http://partners.nytimes.com/library/national/061697army-mckinney.html
[73] http://www.huffingtonpost.com/michael-rowe/taps-for-barry-winchell-r_b_226004.html
[74] http://articles.baltimoresun.com/1997-05-24/news/1997144033_1_kelly-flinn-adultery-air-force
[75] http://www.gallup.com/poll/1597/Confidence-Institutions.aspx
[76] http://literature.org/authors/carroll-lewis/through-the-looking-glass/index.html
[77] https://twitter.com/TomDispatch
[78] http://www.facebook.com/tomdispatch
[79] http://www.amazon.com/dp/1608464636/ref=nosim/?tag=tomdispatch-20
[80] http://www.amazon.com/dp/1608463656/ref=nosim/?tag=tomdispatch-20
[81] mailto:corrections@alternet.org?Subject=Typo on Sorry, the Idea that Civilians Control the US Military Is Pure Fantasy
[82] http://www.alternet.org/
[83] http://www.alternet.org/%2Bnew_src%2B
[2] http://www.tomdispatch.com
[3] http://www.military.com/daily-news/2016/01/13/10-sailors-detained-in-iran-returned-to-us-navy.html
[4] http://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-gitmo-release-special-report-idUSKBN0UB1B020151228
[5] http://www.closeguantanamo.org/Prisoners
[6] http://www.military.com/daily-news/2016/01/30/pentagon-tells-senate-it-wont-demote-retired-gen-petraeus.html
[7] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chelsea_Manning
[8] http://www.nytimes.com/2010/04/06/world/middleeast/06baghdad.html
[9] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Granai_airstrike
[10] http://nationalinterest.org/article/out-of-control-the-crisis-in-civil-military-relations-343
[11] http://www.nytimes.com/1993/06/16/us/general-to-be-disciplined-for-disparaging-president.html
[12] http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/1997/07/the-widening-gap-between-military-and-society/306158/
[13] http://www.rollingstone.com/politics/news/the-runaway-general-20100622
[14] http://www.pcr.uu.se/research/ucdp/charts_and_graphs/#region
[15] http://www.globalfirepower.com/defense-spending-budget.asp
[16] http://knoema.com/nwnfkne/world-gdp-ranking-2015-data-and-charts
[17] https://www.nationalpriorities.org/interactive-data/trade-offs/
[18] http://fas.org/sgp/crs/weapons/R44320.pdf
[19] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_United_States_military_bases
[20] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_military_deployments
[21] http://bos.sagepub.com/content/71/2/107.full.pdf+html
[22] http://www.nytimes.com/2014/09/22/us/us-ramping-up-major-renewal-in-nuclear-arms.html
[23] http://www.economist.com/news/briefing/21645840-despite-optimistic-attempts-rid-world-nuclear-weapons-threat-they-pose-peace
[24] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_treaties_unsigned_or_unratified_by_the_United_States
[25] http://www.yale.edu/lawweb/avalon/imt/kbpact.htm
[26] http://www.un.org/en/conf/npt/2005/npttreaty.html
[27] http://www.hrweb.org/legal/cat.html
[28] https://www.icrc.org/en/war-and-law/treaties-customary-law/geneva-conventions
[29] http://www.dni.gov/index.php/intelligence-community/members-of-the-ic
[30] http://fas.org/sgp/crs/natsec/R42077.pdf
[31] http://www.tomdispatch.com/post/176048/tomgram%3A_nick_turse,_a_secret_war_in_135_countries/
[32] http://www.tomdispatch.com/post/175945/tomgram%3A_nick_turse%2C_a_shadow_war_in_150_countries/
[33] http://www.armed-services.senate.gov/imo/media/doc/Votel_07-10-14.pdf
[34] http://archive.defense.gov/pubs/2014_Quadrennial_Defense_Review.pdf
[35] http://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2015/02/10/fat-leonard-bribery-navy/23198913/
[36] http://www.armytimes.com/story/military/crime/2016/01/06/7-more-soldiers-charged-national-guard-recruiting-fraud-conspiracy/78371086/
[37] http://www.nydailynews.com/news/national/general-demoted-extravagant-trips-article-1.1201284
[38] http://www.theguardian.com/world/2013/oct/09/us-nuclear-commander-tim-giardina-fired-amid-gambling-investigation
[39] http://www.nydailynews.com/news/national/air-force-general-michael-carey-fired-epic-drunken-bender-moscow-article-1.1554042
[40] http://usnews.nbcnews.com/_news/2013/05/21/18403871-army-general-suspended-from-duties-amid-adultery-investigation?lite
[41] https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/national-security/disgraced-army-general-jeffrey-a-sinclair-receives-fine-no-jail-time/2014/03/20/c555b650-b039-11e3-95e8-39bef8e9a48b_story.html
[42] http://www.military.com/daily-news/2015/06/04/special-operations-general-lost-command-for-public-drunkenness.html
[43] https://www.rt.com/usa/navy-civilian-ranked-resigns-corruption-668/
[44] http://nypost.com/2014/02/05/exam-cheating-scandal-hits-navy-nuclear-training-school/
[45] http://www.theguardian.com/world/2013/aug/23/afghanistan-massacre-robert-bales-trial
[46] http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/northamerica/usa/8883384/Ringleader-of-US-army-kill-team-sentenced-to-life-for-murder-of-Afghans.html
[47] http://www.rollingstone.com/feature/a-team-killings-afghanistan-special-forces
[48] http://www.theguardian.com/world/2012/sep/24/us-marines-charged-dead-taliban
[49] http://articles.latimes.com/2012/apr/18/nation/la-na-afghan-photos-20120418
[50] http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/asia/afghanistan/9502439/US-troops-burned-100-copies-of-the-Koran-in-Afghanistan.html
[51] http://sapr.mil/public/docs/reports/FY14_Annual/FY14_DoD_SAPRO_Annual_Report_on_Sexual_Assault.pdf
[52] https://themilitarysuicidereport.wordpress.com/tag/harry-lew/
[53] http://articles.latimes.com/2012/jul/30/nation/la-na-nn-danny-chen-suicide-case-verdict-20120730
[54] http://www.rawa.org/temp/runews/2010/04/05/us-special-forces-tried-to-cover-up-botched-khataba-raid-in-afghanistan.html
[55] http://articles.latimes.com/2013/jan/23/nation/la-na-nn-lackland-scandal-hearing-20130123
[56] http://www.salon.com/2008/05/09/cnn_abc/
[57] http://www.cbsnews.com/news/military-trial-begins-in-navy-sex-scandal/
[58] http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/02/17/AR2007021701172.html
[59] http://www.military.com/NewsContent/0,13319,156902,00.html
[60] http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/07/02/AR2006070200673_pf.html
[61] http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=6496916
[62] http://abcnews.go.com/Politics/US/uss-enterprise-commander-capt-owen-honors-popular-successful/story?id=12536216
[63] http://www.cnn.com/2013/10/30/world/meast/haditha-killings-fast-facts/index.html
[64] http://www.boston.com/news/world/middleeast/articles/2005/12/01/us_planting_stories_in_iraqi_newspapers/
[65] http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=112816210
[66] http://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2004/05/10/torture-at-abu-ghraib
[67] http://www.nytimes.com/2005/05/20/world/asia/in-us-report-brutal-details-of-2-afghan-inmates-deaths.html?_r=1
[68] http://www.nytimes.com/2013/05/13/booming/revisiting-the-militarys-tailhook-scandal-video.html
[69] http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/local/longterm/library/aberdeen/caution.htm
[70] http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/01/13/camp-lejeune-water-contamination-navy-letter_n_1203465.html
[71] https://worldhistoryproject.org/1998/2/3/cavalese-cable-car-disaster
[72] http://partners.nytimes.com/library/national/061697army-mckinney.html
[73] http://www.huffingtonpost.com/michael-rowe/taps-for-barry-winchell-r_b_226004.html
[74] http://articles.baltimoresun.com/1997-05-24/news/1997144033_1_kelly-flinn-adultery-air-force
[75] http://www.gallup.com/poll/1597/Confidence-Institutions.aspx
[76] http://literature.org/authors/carroll-lewis/through-the-looking-glass/index.html
[77] https://twitter.com/TomDispatch
[78] http://www.facebook.com/tomdispatch
[79] http://www.amazon.com/dp/1608464636/ref=nosim/?tag=tomdispatch-20
[80] http://www.amazon.com/dp/1608463656/ref=nosim/?tag=tomdispatch-20
[81] mailto:corrections@alternet.org?Subject=Typo on Sorry, the Idea that Civilians Control the US Military Is Pure Fantasy
[82] http://www.alternet.org/
[83] http://www.alternet.org/%2Bnew_src%2B
Donations can be sent
to the Baltimore Nonviolence Center, 325 E. 25th St., Baltimore, MD
21218. Ph: 410-323-1607; Email: mobuszewski [at] verizon.net. Go to http://baltimorenonviolencecenter.blogspot.com/
"The master class
has always declared the wars; the subject class has always fought the battles.
The master class has had all to gain and nothing to lose, while the subject
class has had nothing to gain and everything to lose--especially their
lives." Eugene Victor Debs
No comments:
Post a Comment