Military spending makes up a dominant share of discretionary spending in the United States; military personnel make up the majority of U.S. government manpower; and military industry is a leading force in the U.S. economy. This report finds that as a result, other elements and capacities of the U.S. government and civilian economy have been weakened, and military industries have gained political power. Decades of high levels of military spending have changed U.S. government and society — strengthening its ability to fight wars, while weakening its capacities to perform other core functions. Investments in infrastructure, healthcare, education, and emergency preparedness, for instance, have all suffered as military spending and industry have crowded them out. Increased resources channeled to the military further increase the political power of military industries, ensuring that the cycle of economic dependence continues — militarized sectors of the economy see perpetual increases in funding and manpower while other human needs go unmet.
Tag: military industrial complex
Big US investors prop up the nuclear weapons industry
Nuclear weapons aren’t just a threat to human survival, they’re a multi-billion-dollar business supported by some of the biggest institutional investors in the U.S. according to new data released today by the International Campaign to Abolish Nuclear Weapons (ICAN) and PAX, the largest peace organization in the Netherlands.
For the third year in a row, globally, the number of investors in nuclear weapons producers has fallen but the overall amount invested in these companies has increased, largely thanks to some of the biggest investment banks and funds in the U.S.
“As for the U.S., while there is, like past years, indeed a dominance, and total financing from U.S.-based institutions has increased, the total number of U.S. investors has dropped for the third year in a row (similar to our global findings), and we hope to see this number will continue to fall in the coming years,” Alejandar Munoz, the report’s primary author, told Responsible Statecraft.
In 2023, the top 10 share and bondholders of nuclear weapons producing companies are all American firms. The firms — Vanguard, Capital Group, State Street, BlackRock, Wellington Management, Fidelity Investments, Newport Group, Geode Capital Holdings, Bank of America and Morgan Stanley — held $327 billion in investments in nuclear weapons producing companies in 2023, an $18 billion increase from 2022.
These companies are also profiting from the enormous government contracts they receive for developing and modernizing nuclear weapons.
“All nuclear-armed states are currently modernizing their nuclear weapon systems,” says the annual “Don’t Bank on the Bomb” report from PAX and ICAN. “In 2022, the nine nuclear-armed states together spent $82.9 billion on their nuclear weapons arsenals, an increase of $2.5 billion compared to the previous year, and with the United States spending more than all other nuclear powers combined.”
American weapons companies are some of the biggest recipients of contracts for nuclear weapons. Northrop Grumman and General Dynamics are “the biggest nuclear weapons profiteers,” according to the report. Combined, the two American weapons manufacturers have outstanding nuclear weapons related contracts with a combined potential value of at least $44.9 billion.
Those enormous government contracts for nuclear weapons, alongside contracts for conventional weapons, have helped make nuclear weapons producers an attractive investment for American investment banks and funds.
“Altogether, 287 financial institutions were identified for having substantial financing or investment relations with 24 companies involved in nuclear weapon production,” says the report. “$477 billion was held in bonds and shares, and $343 billion was provided in loans and underwriting.”
The report notes that while the total amount invested in nuclear weapons has increased, the number of investors has fallen and trends toward firms in countries with nuclear weapons.
NAVAL RESEARCH LABORATORY LEVERAGES EXOTIC PROPERTIES OF 2D WAVEGUIDES TO CAPTURE THE LIGHT OF DARK EXCITONS
A milestone discovery of waveguides based on two-dimensional materials with “exotic” properties has been achieved, according to researchers with the United States Naval Research Laboratory (NRL).
The breakthrough was achieved during studies involving hexagonal boron nitride, a two-dimensional material, by the U.S. Navy’s official corporate research lab while working with researchers from Kansas State University.
EXPERIMENTS IN THE REALM OF 2D MATERIALS
2D materials are a unique class of substances that result from the reduction of a material to its recognized monolayer limits through processes of mechanical peeling. This results in a unique class of ultra-thin 2D materials which have a variety of applications.
The most famous 2D material is graphene, which is formed from bonded carbon atoms to create a sheet that is just one atom in thickness. Such materials can be separated into layers by exploiting what is known as the van der Waals attraction, which describes an attracting force between atoms or molecules that is dependent on distance, rather than chemical bonding.
Following successful recent experiments with graphene, researchers have engaged in experimentation with other novel 2D materials, including hexagonal boron nitride (BN), the softest and most stable of BN’s forms which has already seen applications as a lubricant in machine components, as well as in some cosmetic products.
However, of greater interest to studies at the NRL are the ways these materials can be leveraged at the nanoscale level. This makes them particularly useful for developing applications where extremely thin optical and electrical components are necessary.
Hexagonal boron nitride is a particularly special case, given that past samples examined by NRL scientists revealed its potentially useful optical qualities. However, further studies soon revealed a surprise: that the compound possessed other hidden, and extremely promising capabilities.
FLASHBACK: Sentient world: war games on the grandest scale
Perhaps your real life is so rich you don’t have time for another.
Even so, the US Department of Defense (DOD) may already be creating a copy of you in an alternate reality to see how long you can go without food or water, or how you will respond to televised propaganda.
The DOD is developing a parallel to Planet Earth, with billions of individual “nodes” to reflect every man, woman, and child this side of the dividing line between reality and AR.
Called the Sentient World Simulation (SWS), it will be a “synthetic mirror of the real world with automated continuous calibration with respect to current real-world information”, according to a concept paper for the project.
“SWS provides an environment for testing Psychological Operations (PSYOP),” the paper reads, so that military leaders can “develop and test multiple courses of action to anticipate and shape behaviors of adversaries, neutrals, and partners”.
SWS also replicates financial institutions, utilities, media outlets, and street corner shops. By applying theories of economics and human psychology, its developers believe they can predict how individuals and mobs will respond to various stressors.
FLASHBACK: Weaponized Narrative Is the New Battlespace
Conventional military dominance is still critical to the superpower status of the United States. But even in a military sense, it is no longer enough: if an American election can be controlled by an adversarial power, then stealth aircraft and special forces are not the answer. With lawmakers poised to authorize $160 million to counter Russian “fake news” and disinformation, and the CIA and the Congress examining meddling in the U.S. election and democracies around the world, it’s time to see weaponized narrative for what it is: a deep threat to national security.
Weaponized narrative seeks to undermine an opponent’s civilization, identity, and will by generating complexity, confusion, and political and social schisms. It can be used tactically, as part of explicit military or geopolitical conflict; or strategically, as a way to reduce, neutralize, and defeat a civilization, state, or organization. Done well, it limits or even eliminates the need for armed force to achieve political and military aims.
The efforts to muscle into the affairs of the American presidency, Brexit, the Ukraine, the Baltics, and NATO reflect a shift to a “post-factual” political and cultural environment that is vulnerable to weaponized narrative. This begs three deeper questions:
- How global is this phenomenon?
- Are the underlying drivers temporary or systemic?
- What are the implications for an American military used to technological dominance?
Far from being simply a U.S. or U.K. phenomenon, shifts to “post-factualism” can be seen in Poland, Hungary, Turkey, France, and the Philippines, among other democracies. Russia, whose own political culture is deeply post-factual and indeed post-modern, is now ably constructing ironic, highly cynical, weaponized narratives that were effective in the Ukrainian invasion, and are now destabilizing the Baltic states and the U.S. election process.
Such a large and varied shift to weaponized narrative implies that the enablers are indeed systemic. One fundamental underpinning – often overlooked – is the accelerating volume and velocity of information. Cultures, institutions, and individuals are, among many other things, information-processing mechanisms. As they become overwhelmed with information complexity, the tendency to retreat into simpler narratives becomes stronger.
The Global Deep State: A Fascist World Order Funded by the American Taxpayer
The debate over U.S. foreign aid is a distraction.
That’s not to say that the amount of taxpayer money flowing to foreign countries in the form of military and economic assistance is insignificant. Even at less than 1% of the federal budget, the United States still spends more on foreign aid than any other nation.
The latest foreign aid spending bill includes $95 billion for Ukraine, Israel and Taiwan.
Since World War II, the U.S. has given more foreign aid to Israel than any other country ($318 billion), with the bulk of those funds designated for Israel’s military efforts.
Even so, more than 150 countries around the world receive U.S. taxpayer-funded assistance.
As Forbes reports, “U.S. foreign aid dwarfs the federal funds spent by 48 out of 50 state governments annually. Only the state governments of California and New York spent more federal funds than what the U.S. sent abroad each year to foreign countries.”
Whether or not that some of that foreign aid is used for legitimate purposes, the global welfare system itself is riddled with corruption and waste. As Adam Andrzejewski rightly asks, “Do taxpayers instinctively know that they are funding choir directors in Turkmenistan, filmmakers in Peru, aid for poultry farmers Tanzania, and sex education workshops for prostitutes in Ethiopia?”
The problem is not so much that taxpayers are unaware of how their hard-earned dollars are being spent. Rather, “we the people” continue to be told that we have no say in the matter.
We have no real say in how the government runs, or how our taxpayer funds are used, but that doesn’t prevent the government from fleecing us at every turn and forcing us to pay for endless wars that do more to fund the military industrial complex than protect us, pork barrel projects that produce little to nothing, and a police state that serves only to imprison us within its walls.
This financial tyranny persists whether it’s a Democrat or Republican at the helm.
U.S. Military Told Pharma Exec the Virus “Posed a National Security Threat” on February 4th 2020 – Weeks Before a Single Death Occurred
A leaked recording obtained by investigator and writer Sasha Latypova features an executive at the pharmaceutical company AstraZeneca stating the following:
It wasn’t a surprise to me when I got a call on February 4th from the Defence Department here in the U.S. saying that the newly discovered SARS-2 virus posed a national security threat.
This is an astonishing, major-newspaper headline-worthy revelation.
Here’s what was happening on February 4th 2020:
Virus activity in the U.S.:
- According to CNN, on February 4th there were 11 “confirmed cases of the novel coronavirus” in the United States.
- There were zero reported deaths from the virus in the U.S.
- As documented in my recently launched Covid Timeline Wiki Project, the New York Times had two headlines about the virus focused on China and travellers from Wuhan. There were no op-eds on the virus.
Virus activity internationally:
- Approximately 490 reported deaths.
- The disease caused by the virus had not even been named “COVID-19” yet.
- The WHO said the outbreak “was not yet a pandemic”.
Behind-the-scenes virus-related activity: EUA & PREP Act:
- Crucially, the FDA and HHS declared the first emergency basis for issuance of Emergency Use Authorisation (EUA) for Covid on February 4th.
- EUA is an authority that was granted to the FDA “to strengthen public health protections against biological, chemical, nuclear and radiological agents”.
- As explained in a previous article, EUA powers were granted to the FDA to be used in situations of grave, immediate emergencies involving weapons of mass destruction. They were intended to allow the use of countermeasures against biological, chemical, nuclear or radiological (CBRN) agents without going through all the usual steps of ensuring safety and efficacy, because the immediate threat of the CBRN attack would be so much greater than any potential risks caused by the countermeasure.
- In conjunction with EUA, PREP Act protection was also granted retroactively to February 4th (announced March 17th). The Public Readiness and Emergency Preparedness (PREP) Act, as noted in a previous article, legally indemnifies from all liability anyone who does anything related to a product that receives Emergency Use Authorisation. Again, this was intended for very extreme emergency situations involving CBRN agents, so that if a countermeasure caused harm while being used during the attack, no one would get sued.
Origins cover-up:
- Anthony Fauci, Jeremy Farrar, Francis Collins, Eddie Holmes and others in the international group of gain-of-function funders and researchers were conspiring to publish multiple documents denying the possibility that the virus could have emerged from the virus lab they were funding and working with in Wuhan, China.
- Emily Kopp at U.S. Right to Know has compiled a detailed timeline of these activities, many of which occurred on the days just before and just after February 4th 2020.
US Army spent billions on a new helicopter that now will never fly
The U.S. Army is ending its latest effort to build a new armed scout helicopter, known as the Future Attack Reconnaissance Aircraft, an abrupt change of direction that marks one of the department’s most significant program cancellations of the last decade.
The service had already spent at least $2 billion on the program and had requested another $5 billion for the next five years, according to budget documents.
The helicopter program arrived in 2018 with lofty expectations. Army leaders hoped it would serve as a model for new acquisition approaches for its most complex and most expensive weapon systems. Prototypes from Bell Textron and Lockheed Martin’s Sikorsky were expected to fly later this year. And, perhaps most importantly, the aircraft was slated to provide a long-needed armed scout solution after decades of starts and stops.
But Thursday, the Army’s top acquisition officials described a new vision and major aviation overhaul. In addition to ending FARA, the Army plans to get rid of its entire Shadow and Raven unmanned aircraft fleets, said Doug Bush, the service’s acquisition chief.
It will also stop fielding its new replacement for UH-60 Lima-model Black Hawk utility helicopter — the Victor-model — to the Army National Guard and instead field UH-60 Mike-models, the latest variant used in the active force, Bush said.
Finally, the service will delay procurement of its next-generation helicopter engine, which was set to be used in all UH-60s, AH-64 Apache attack helicopters as well as to power FARA.
World War Grift – Who’s Driving the Global ‘Defense’ Racket
War is a bad thing. Most people will agree. Often a war is perpetrated for an ostensibly good cause. It is seen as an unfortunate side effect that regular people are killed, maimed, scarred and diminished – whilst the ‘baddies’ somehow remain at large. Well then, if war is bad, and often ineffective, why does it continue?
In this article we will delve into the private corporations who insidiously overlap with their governmental and media counterparts to promote, fund and facilitate endless conflicts. We will also assess the case for acts of war and explore the theory that war is often perpetrated for financial profit rather than any moral cause.
Cui Bono?
‘Cui Bono’ is a fancy Latin phrase, that you might hear from Sherlock Holmes during an investigation. It means, ‘Who benefits?’. It is often used in political discourse as a knife to cut through the tangled webs of intrigue and speculation around events and get to the heart of the matter. Here we are discussing a global business, arms manufacturing and sales. It is a worldwide industry and has myriad influences. When it is presented in sound-bites by the corporate-owned media, we are seeing a glimpse, only a small portion of the picture. It is usually designed to make the reader or viewer think a certain thing – as we will discuss later. Yet when we take a wide-lens view the picture becomes cloudy with many different angles. We ask cui bono? – who benefits from violent conflict, in particular those hot conflicts of today: Ukraine/Russia, Israel/Palestine, Saudi Arabia/Yemen and so on?
It is an easy implication to lay at the door of the arms industry. More violence is more profit. Even mere instability in a country can lead to a ramping up of arms purchases by the military of a state. The massive price tags for weapons, the long lead-time of research and development coupled with the bottomless pockets of government budgets make for a fertile landscape for exploitation. It is not only the private military corporations who benefit, but the politicians and nation states too. The politicians get huge kickbacks from lobbyists, too much money to maintain that moral compass they may have once had. They also have a useful ‘casus belli’ – a ‘case for war’ which is a sure fire vote winner. Remember that Margaret Thatcher was set to lose her seat as leader of the UK until a miraculous military victory over Argentina in 1982 galvanised massive public support and a massive electoral victory. War for votes is nothing new. Yet these days, selling war is an uphill battle. I believe, perhaps naively, that most people don’t like suffering and violence. The Anglophonic destruction of Iraq through two wars ended up an unpopular decision, similarly the US’ failed conquest in Vietnam is viewed regretfully in hindsight. So we are left pondering, why must suffering the curse of armed warfare continue?
Before we delve too deep into the long grass, let us set our sights on our targets. We know the names of countries, sometimes politicians, but who are the arms dealers, the manufacturers of death who lurk in the shadows and create shiny new weapons of mass destruction?
Military May Get Its Own SpaceX Starship Rockets For Dangerous Missions
The Pentagon has approached SpaceX regarding the purchase of Starship space launch vehicles for sensitive, high-risk missions, the company has said. At present, the U.S. government relies on non-military contractors to launch payloads for various operations, including satellite launches, and does not have its own space launch vehicles — at least any that are disclosed — which it could deploy in a potential contingency scenario. SpaceX is already working with the Air Force and Space Force on the ‘Rocket Cargo’ program, which seeks to rapidly deliver cargo, and possible personnel, anywhere on Earth that can support a landing.
Aviation Week was the first to report on the DoD’s interest in Starship, following comments made by a SpaceX official at the Space Mobility Conference in Orlando, Florida on January 30.
SpaceX’s complete ‘Starship’ system, as The War Zone has highlighted in the past, comprises a super-heavy rocket booster and spacecraft. Starship — which will be capable of landing vertically — constitutes the largest, and most powerful, rocket ever flown, according to the company, and is reportedly capable of carrying up to 150 metric tons while being fully reusable. Eventually, SpaceX intends for its Starship system to carry crew and cargo to Earth orbit, the Moon, and Mars, but it is still in relatively early flight test development.
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