War, who is it good for?

How have we become the global participant in forever wars? Spending half our discretionary federal appropriations on war. More than the next 10 nations combined. Running up debt of $32 trillion, with interest payments over $600 billion annually.

We are as far from what the founders provided as could be imagined. They wanted to avoid wars.

In the U.S. House of Representatives own website there’s a discussion of its constitutional war powers (Article I, section 8, clauses 11-16). “The Congress shall have power … to declare war ….”

In the website’s discussion of the founders’ intentions it says, “The decision to send the nation to war is perhaps Congress’s gravest responsibility …. For the Members, to declare war against a foreign power is to send their constituents, their neighbors, their family, and even themselves into harm’s way. … The founders felt that war should be difficult to enter, and they expected congressional debate to restrain the war-making process.”

They presumed wars would require a draft and pay-as-you-go financing.

How’s that been working for us? Pretty well through World War II — the last time Congress complied with the constitutional requirement it “declare war.” Following World War II the war budget was around $14 billion (in today’s dollars).

Then things began to change.

The Vietnam War protests made clear that if the U.S. wanted to actually use the military taxpayers were paying for, the 1 percent who actually fought the wars would have to be either volunteers or the mercenaries of defense contractors.

So, the draft was abolished, Jan. 27, 1973. House members could quietly go along with fighting a war without either supporting, or opposing, the declaration of one. No mothers cried; their sons stayed home. The financial cost of wars could be camouflaged from taxpayers by putting it on a credit card and increasing the debt limit.

The military’s best and brightest explained the need for a rationale for war, the benefits and costs of fighting one, and the need for exit strategies. But few House members seemed to be listening.

In 1969, the song writers gave us “War, What’s It Good For? Absolutely Nothing.” It doesn’t get a lot of play these days. Besides, what we should be singing is, “War, Who’s It Good For?”

There’s an answer to that one.

Decades ago, my research revealed that the payback on corporate campaign contributions ran at least 1000-to-one. Give a million, get a billion (e.g., federal contracts, tax cuts, tariffs).

Today that’s increased a bit. With a trillion-dollar budget for war, it’s not only too big to fail, it’s too big to audit. But some numbers are available.

One contractor’s political contributions for one year were $3 million. A 1000-to-one return would have been $3 billion. But this contractor got $40 billion in contracts. Not a 1000-to-one return; a 13,000-to-one return.

Meanwhile, Congress talks about cutting the budget — while continuing to add more for war than even requested.

Nicholas Johnson, as U.S. Maritime Administrator, had some responsibility for sealift to Vietnam. mailbox@nicholasjohnson.org