Tag: military-industrial complex

Fallujah: Death and destruction again, Part I

Posted on by kathiemm

By guest author Ian Hansen

As a supporter of human rights and locally-controlled democracy in Iraq, I am dismayed to see Fallujah fall to Al Qaeda.

Al-Qa'ida training manual
Al-Qa’ida training manual, CIA Virtual Museum. Image in public domain, from Wikimedia Commons

Some may see poetic justice for the U.S. in this development: the U.S. war of aggression has clearly backfired in Fallujah. But there’s no justice in it for the people of that historic city. I would have been happy to see Fallujah residents lead a nonviolent civil disobedience movement to regain control over their communities, but the ascendance of Al Qaeda there is a tragedy.

The people of Fallujah have already endured enough massacres, destruction of the city’s ancient buildings and mosques, and chemical weapons horrors from the U.S. siege in 2004. And although the draconian rule of the U.S.-aligned Iraqi Security Forces should be overthrown by local democratic rule, the siege by Al Qaeda is, if anything, a regression, not an improvement.

Al Qaeda is not a progressive organization, and there is nothing redeeming about it. It’s a violent oppressive scourge on Islam in much the same way that the Christian Coalition–and the U.S. military-industrial-ideological machine generally–is a violent and oppressive scourge on Christianity.

It is not a coincidence that Al Qaeda as a movement arises largely from the Arabian Peninsula, most of which is controlled by an oil-rich U.S.-Israeli ally (Saudi Arabia). Saudi Arabia–one of the most draconian autocracies in the Middle East–is playing a disgraceful role in the Syrian disaster right now; it just got around to abolishing slavery in 1962. Al Qaeda is at odds with the Saudi regime in obvious ways, but in other obvious ways Al Qaeda mirrors its core values.

And I don’t think that violent decision-makers in the U.S. actually want Al Qaeda to disappear (though until more evidence pours in, this is more of an accusation against our leadership’s unconscious intentions than their conscious ones).

Even at the time of 9/11, Al Qaeda was originally a pretty paltry and unpopular group. The Afghanistan and Iraq wars, the drone assassinations, and the other Joint Special Operation Command-CIA paramilitary killings all over the world seem to have only magnified Al Qaeda’s international presence.

Ian Hansen, Ph.D., is an assistant professor in the Department of Behavioral Sciences at York College, City University of New York. His research focuses in part on how witness for human rights and peace can transcend explicit political ideology. He is also on the Steering Committee for Psychologists for Social Responsibility.

The road to militarization: Paved in video games?

Posted on by kathiemm

With no universal conscription, how does the military-industrial complex entice young people into the military?

Young men playing at video arcade.
Photo by KoS, used under CC Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 Unported license.

It certainly helps to keep a substantial portion of the population poor and to limit job opportunities for people of color. But to increase the enthusiasm of adolescents for a career involving weapons, violence, and death, what could be a better avenue than video games?

Don’t assume for one minute that the arms manufacturers and the video game industry are not in bed with each other.

For decades, Lockheed Martin weapons have appeared in extremely violent video games—e.g., Homefront and Tom Clancy’s Ghost Recon Advanced Warfighter–in which Americans kill, kill, and kill various enemies threatening the country’s liberty.

Such games are case studies in moral disengagement:

Lockheed Martin reciprocated, deliberately developing for one of their complex aircraft a training module that resembled a video game and “leveraged” video game technology for “tracking and interpreting real-time events during military operation(s).” Indeed, they bought their own video game maker, 3Dsolve, to develop training materials.

There is considerable evidence—although not undisputed—that exposure to violent video games can teach and increase violent behavior, violent thoughts, and violent emotions [links open in pdf].

The bad news is that this connection may serve the military well, convincing children that war is a game, that “wasting” others is fun, and that massive death and destruction are justifiable.

The good news is that prosocial video games appear to promote prosocial behavior [link opens in pdf].

What are your thoughts about how to promote prosocial videos in a culture of violence?

Kathie Malley-Morrison, Professor of Psychology

9/11 and the imminent demise of democracy

Posted on by kathiemm

Realistically, we should remember that some people celebrated the catastrophic events of September 11, 2001, with glee.

  • Their wildest dream was coming true.
  • All those millions of American TVs tuned in to death, destruction, and devastation.
  • All that fear and anger!
  • It was better even than the Gulf of Tonkin incident!

I am not talking about Arabs or Muslims, the vast majority of whom shared our horror and outrage on 9/11.

I am also not talking about the people our government brands as terrorists or potential terrorists, although terrorists these people may be.

I am talking about Americans, a select group of Americans within the military-industrial complex who profit from wars, who lust for power, who would sell out any of us and call it patriotism.

I am talking about Americans, overwhelmingly white, overwhelmingly male, overwhelmingly greedy, who enjoy enormous power, who constitute the shadow government hiding, in many cases, behind the shirts of the best elected officials money can buy.

Those Americans watched the relentless videos of the collapse of the towers and saw dollar signs and weapons contracts. They saw a frightened and angry public ready to support the Patriot Act, which accelerated the theft of their rights, the suppression of their freedoms, the death of their democracy, and the empowerment of the shadowy National Security Agency. The overreaching of that agency should appall us all.

Former President Jimmy Carter, who praised Edward Snowden for releasing information about government spying, recently commented that “America is no longer a functioning democracy.”

If democracy is to be revived, if we are to have a fair chance at peace, we need to be critical consumers of the news–and we need to follow the money.

Who wants war and why? Who wants peace and why? What will benefit YOU?

Kathie Malley-Morrison, Professor of Psychology

When to call it a weapon of mass destruction (WMD)?

Posted on by kathiemm

In its Criminal Complaint against accused Boston Marathon bomber Dzokhar Tsarnaev, the FBI charged him with “unlawfully using and conspiring to use a weapon of mass destruction (namely, an improvised explosive device).” That is, the FBI labeled the pressure cooker device that killed two people and injured more than 200 others a WMD.

Boston Marathon bombing site
Boston Marathon bombing site. Photo by Aaron Tang used under CC Attribution 2.0 Generic license.

Glen Greenwald, in the Guardian, wrote a powerful essay entitled “Why is Boston ‘terrorism’ but not Aurora, Sandy Hook, Tucson and Columbine?” Reminder:

  • In Aurora, 12 people were killed and 58 others wounded with multiple weapons, including a semiautomatic rifle.
  • In Sandy Hook, 20 school children and six adults were murdered with a semiautomatic assault rifle.
  • In Tuscon, six people were killed and 14 (including Gabrielle Giffords) were wounded by a semiautomatic pistol.
  • In Columbine, 12 students and one teacher were killed and 24 others were injured by several weapons, including a semiautomatic pistol.

So, here’s another question: When can a weapon or weapon system be called a weapon of mass destruction? Choose one or more of the following answers:

  1. When it falls into the category of nuclear, biological, or chemical (NBC) weapons.
  2. When its sale and use does not profit the weapons industry.
  3. When it can result in as many fatalities over time as nuclear weapons systems.
  4. When it serves the purposes of the military-industrial-corporate media complex.

Let’s consider these possibilities in relation to the Tsarnaev brothers’ pressure cooker devices.

  1. The most common definition of WMD has been NBC weapons. Pressure cooker bombs do not fall into this category.
  2. The pressure cooker bomb does not profit the weapons industry, although semiautomatic weapons do.
  3. Since World War II, pressure cooker bombs have accounted for a miniscule  portion of fatalities. In contrast, as reported (opens in PDF) by UN Secretary General Kofi Annan, “small arms” have killed as many people as all other weapons combined.
  4. You decide: in what ways can frequent use of the term “weapons of mass destruction” play into the hands of the military-industrial corporate media complex that Republican President Dwight D. Eisenhower warned our country to beware?

Kathie Malley-Morrison, Professor of Psychology