The National Security State

When we realize that the United States of America is simultaneously a democracy, a republic, an empire, and a national security police state, we turn to the question: what is the national security state?

It began as the National Security Act of 1947, which created the National Security Council, which in January 1950 produced a blue print for a new kind of country. Thus, 1950 can be considered the beginning of the american national security state we have today.

It is entirely different from anything that went before. Always before, the U.S. armed itself when war beckoned, and disarmed during peace time, and invested its resources in internal improvements, building roads, and so forth. (Now, our roads crumble, but we remain militarily strong.) 

The actual national security document, declassified in 1975, known as NSC-68, commmitted the U.S., and still commits us, essentially, to the following program.

First, never negotiate in good faith with the Soviet Union, and blame the cold war on the Soviets. This could not last forever, but it served its purpose well; it convinced the american people that danger was at the door. By the time the Soviet empire crumbled and Russia was exposed as the third world country it has always been, the national security apparatus was firmly in place, untouchable.

Second, build up an immense nuclear and hydrogen bomb arsonal, and a huge permanently standing conventional armed force.  Third, tax the american workers to pay for it, while mobilizing the attitude of the american people to support the new permanent military industrial complex, wherein the corporations get the huge military procurement contracts then pay for the election of political leaders who support and further the security state.

The tragedy is that the United States was the wealthiest nation on earth for at least a decade following world war two. Military spending, which has dominated our policy ever since WWII, has resulted in a nation which can no longer afford to repair its crumbling infrastructure, or meet our educational and health care needs, and is barely in the top twenty in per capita prosperity among the nations of the world.

Please scroll down for the other articles in today's issue of The Truthless Reconciler.Thanks!