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Short Essay Military Industrial Complex

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Tejuana Thomas – Module 11 – Short Essay

The military-industrial complex is generally defined as a "coalition consisting of the military and industrialists who profit by manufacturing arms and selling them to the government." Many have long advocated for effective air and ground power as an element in our military force structure. However, many have argued the necessity; simply because of the costs that will occur. This result in a prevalent hesitation and the thought that the military industrial complex is building weapons that the military does not want. However, a great majority of the American people recognize the importance of maintaining air and ground superiority; especially when the lives of our friends, family and loved-ones are at stake.

With the building of weapons by the Military Industrial Complex, the nature of a battle will be unlike anything the world has ever known. This has been exhibited in Afghanistan with a glimpse of the latest generation of high-tech weaponry. A major assault by combined American forces provided a full demonstration of the military's new doctrine of faster, lighter, smarter warfare. Combat in which cutting-edge technology became U.S. troops' deadliest weapon. The Pentagon called this new doctrine RMA, for "revolution in military affairs". The need for new technology to fight today’s wars, is a necessity for the United States; especially considering that we are battling countries that thrive off force and death at any cost! In building its new high-tech arsenal, the United States has also created a new military-industrial complex.

Cons-Military Industrial Complex

Many point to the fact that human wars are often fought with the least amount of respect for a country’s economy. Wars are costly; therefore, that costs have to be off set in some way. This is often done so through the building of weapons by the Military Industrial Complex. Wars can then be viewed as an economy booster. However, this reason can be careless for countries, such as United States, who may be building and creating weapons for someone that just might use those same weapons against the United States. For economic reasons, even former Presidents of the United States of America have warned us against the costs of industrial military complex. Therefore, the building of weapons that the military does not want only means that these weapons are being built for economic purposes, or more specifically to be sold to other countries. The building and selling of weapons, have been going on since the beginning of time.

The arms industry is huge in the World but, unfortunately, the US is not the only player. In fact Iran recently said it wanted to build nuclear warheads on missiles and sell them to International Terrorists. N. Korea wanted to do the same, selling to any nation, which wanted them. The Sudan recently made a deal to also buy such weaponry.

Then there is also the concern that the monies raised by the building and selling of weaponry by the Military Industrial Complex can be used as an influence in politics. It is known that funds have been allocated towards campaign contributions from foreign sources on the American political process. Arms-makers contribute millions of dollars to members of Congress, who then vote on how much to spend on major weapons systems. They then lobby Congress to pass laws that will create lucrative overseas markets for these same weapons. Then, in collaboration with the Pentagon, their Public Relations departments stage spectacular media events celebrating new weapons.

The fact is that the United States is annually spending more on military security "than the net income of all United States corporations." In fact, the Clinton Administration five-year budget plan for the Pentagon called for a 50% increase in weapons procurement, which would be an increase from $44 billion per year to over $63 billion per year by 2003. Additionally, the arms industry launched "a concerted lobbying campaign aimed at increasing military spending and arms exports. These initiatives are driven by profit and pork barrel politics, not by an objective assessment of how best to defend the United States in the post-cold war period."

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