Posted on 03/18/2014 12:09:32 PM PDT by DJ Taylor
Recently, an associate offered the following observation with regard to the likelihood of war in the immediate future:
“The big guys like to play chess with the world. It's the biggest game. The bankers need ups and downs and wars to make money. The military needs wars to exist. The politicians need both to exist.”
Whilst he was reiterating a concept we have discussed on many occasions, it occurred to me that I have never seen the subject defined so succinctly, nor so informatively.
Let’s break it down:
The bankers need ups and downs and wars to make money
Just as bankers increase their profit as a result of upward and downward economic fluctuations, so, too, do they benefit from war. It is not unusual for a given bank to finance those who would create armed conflict, and indeed, they sometimes bankroll both sides. Whilst banks have other means of making money, war is often more profitable than conventional banking.
The military needs war
The military-industrial complex is in the business of selling armaments to governments. Although armament sales may tick over nicely in peace time, they boom in war time. Therefore, any armament supplier will benefit from war. It matters little whether it is an all-out war or a series of smaller ventures. The object is sales.
The politicians need both banks and war
This is true in the sense that politicians need both bankers and an active military to thrive. Political campaigns depend upon funding. Banks and armament suppliers have long been a major source of campaign funds for candidates of the primary political parties. (If each party is well-paid before the election, favourable treatment towards banks and armament suppliers is assured, regardless of which party wins an election.)
(Excerpt) Read more at internationalman.com ...
Not very satisfying food for thought
Only the dead have seen the end of war.
Precisely. Plato, I believe.
Wow, this is like saying since rain clouds produce rain, anybody who gets rained upon gets wet! Food for thought.
The world will never be a Garden of Eden, but with a little common sense and a dose of the wisdom of humility, the pestilence of war can be greatly mitigated. Europe went nearly a century without general war between the Congress of Vienna that ended the Napoleonic Wars to the outbreak of WWI.
Sure, you might make millions, but there's the non-trivial chance you'll hang from a lamppost or wind up waiting tables in Istanbul.
Regards,
Not, I think, very nutritious food for thought. Here’s a different thought: People with their hands in each other’s pockets are not going to take them out to shoot and kill each other. The developed nations are now too interconnected economically to start wars. Plus, do you really think bankers and politicians want people to die in war so they can enrich themselves? How low is your opinion of these people? This is like the theory that there’s a cure for cancer but medical science is hiding it because there’s SO much money to be made treating cancer. No.
Hitler played that one to the hilt. Used it as the justification for the Holocaust.
Oh yea, it will again be the garden of eden when the Lord wipes out all things of man..nothing like a burning world for a reset...smile..
Cliches and received wisdom. Previously digested food for thought.
Simplistic. And probably a little too America-centric.
Not really.
It is the same pap I have been hearing for the past 40 years and it was old and hoary then.
Such an optimist.
Ferengi Rules of Acquisition:
#35 War is good for business.
#36 Peace is good for business.
Are you really so naive as to think otherwise?
It’s the same kind of stuff the Occupy Wall Street crowd would’ve railed against. The party of war, blame America first, merchants of death, oil for blood, etc.
“There are seasons of our lives when nothing seems to be happening, when no smoke betrays a burned town or homestead and few tears are shed for the newly dead. I have learned not to trust those times, because if the world is at peace then it means someone is planning war.” – Bernard Cornwell, Death of Kings
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