Unraveling what is really going on in America’s so-called “military industrial complex”
The nebulous phrase “military-industrial complex” conjures up a bag of heavy emotions – and for decades, has spawned vivid conspiracies to uncomfortable reflections of truth.
So, what exactly does the term mean, and where did it come from?
The expression was first broadly introduced by President Dwight D. Eisenhower (also a five-star general) in his 1961 Farewell Address. According to Eisenhower, the “Army of Democracy” was necessary to win World War II. However, the outgoing Commander-in-Chief also warned that the United States of America was at the mercy of morphing into a “garrison state,” a nation intently focused on security that it could decimate the political and liberties entrenched at the heart of our unity and values, driven by the tight relationship between government and military services.
While Eisenhower opted to lower military spending and avoid most conflicts erupting in far-flung places, such a precedent waned over the ensuing decades as defense outlays skyrocketed amid the Cold War, Vietnam, Afghanistan, Iraq, Ukraine, and beyond.
These days, the “military-industrial complex” indicates the cozy and mutually beneficial accord between the government – mostly defense – industry and private, defense-orientated manufacturers and organizations. However, the phrase has transformed into a broadly used appellation depicting a billion-dollar sector propelling foreign intervention and conflict to line the pockets of high-powered executives and their government supporters and investors, with taxpayers footing the bill and paying the price for the excess waste and corruption.
Let’s take a deeper look.
A third and a half of the nearly $14 trillion spent by the Pentagon since the attacks of September 11 went to for-profit defense contractors. Dozens of Congress members and their spouses own millions of dollars’ worth of stock in those companies. And then there is the glaring concern of Washington’s murky “revolving door,” in which Pentagon officials routinely leave their posts to lobby or serve on corporate boards – for vast sums of money – with the defense companies they spent years endorsing and issuing contracts too. It also works the other way. Reigning Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin joined the board of Raytheon Technologies following retirement from the armed services before returning to his hallowed government role.
The Government Accountability Office (GAO) found that, between 2014 and 2019, 1,718 former Defense Department officials joined prominent defense contractors. Critics argue that while long-running wars that fail, namely the two decades spent in Afghanistan to the tune of $2.3 trillion – some $300 million per day – not everyone considers it a painful conclusion. After all, there is no shortage of former generals, admirals and defense contractors who made millions from the decades of death and destruction.
Skeptics also contend that decisions about whether to engage in outside wars and conflicts are fashioned by those with a vested commitment to perpetuating war and are not always in the best interest of the American people. Further, media outlets routinely feature former military top-brass and public officials to comment, analyze and anticipate U.S. defense policy and strategies. These talking heads rarely disclose their financial ties to the private sector. The chyron will likely tell you so-and-so is a “retired Navy SEAL” but will rarely state that the industrial sits on the board of Boeing or a like-minded major player.
In addition, a Quincy Institute brief reveals that more than 75 percent of the leading foreign policy think defense contractors partially fund tanks in the United States. Subsequently, think tanks publish articles and reports that support defense-industry funding and the weapons they produce without revealing the conflicts of interest.
Indeed, the defense sector’s livelihood hinges on war, or at least the threat of it. Thus, the industry remains one of the most powerful in politics. According to Open Secrets, a non-profit organization that tracks data on campaign finance and lobbying, the industry spent $101 million in lobbying and contributed over $18 million to political campaigns during the 2022 election cycle, with finances flowing to both Republican and Democrat politicians who sit on committees that actuate defense spending as a means to curry favor. Moreover, from 2002 to 2020, military contractors tripled their political donations, heavily skewed to members of the House and Senate armed services committees and defense appropriations subcommittees.
Other voices speaking against the unofficial “military-industrial complex” will also point out that the United States spends more on defense than at any time in history – more than the ensuing eight countries combined. Last year, the expenditure accounted for over one-third of global military spending. Nonetheless, this money doesn’t materialize from thin air. Detractors emphasize that every cent spent is a cent that could have gone toward education, healthcare, infrastructure or sustainability that directly benefits the American people. We live in a country where we can’t offer adequate and affordable healthcare, but nobody questions the blank check issued to the DoD – the only federal agency that can’t pass an audit.
And just days after the U.S. withdrawal from Afghanistan in the late summer of 2021, under the guise of winding down such longstanding and unwinnable wars, the House Armed Services Committee voted to set the Pentagon’s 2022 budget – increasing the tab by a sizeable $24 billion. This set tongues wagging: is this necessary? Or are there other favors at play?
The 2024 proposed Pentagon budget and nuclear weapons work at the Department of Energy is $886 billion —more than twice as much, adjusted for inflation, as at the time of Eisenhower’s speech. In 2020, Lockheed Martin received $75 billion in Pentagon contracts, more than the entire budget for the State Department and the Agency for International Development combined. The Watson Institute at Brown University found that between a quarter and a third of all Pentagon, contracts have gone to just five major weapons contractors, including Lockheed Martin and Boeing.
And as tensions build over Taiwan, Chinese state media argues that the United States needs the “China threat” narrative to feed its insatiable military-industrial complex and keep the war economy afloat.
Nevertheless, on the flip side, it is important to acknowledge that only the private sector can offer the revolutionary technology that can provide the U.S. with a clear-cut battlefield advantage and act as a deterrent that others argue keeps Americans on home soil safe. Washington’s enviable arsenal of protection power provides a robust diplomatic bargaining chip and may serve as a primary reason adversaries such as North Korea or Iran have not attempted large-scale attacks against the U.S. or its interests.
Moreover, commercial technologies have leaped far ahead of what the defense industry can do in areas such as 3-D printing, cloud computing, cybersecurity, nanotechnology, robotics, and more. These investments during the Cold War also led to the commercial development of computers, semiconductors, and the Internet. These technologies propelled the U.S. to the forefront of the information age.
And deploying these technologies can also be a force for good – from opposing piracy in Africa to defeating evil terrorist organizations such as ISIS in the Middle East.
However, the Pentagon itself is often its worst enemy – hindering potential gains that could both cut costs, drive the innovative industry to a greater leverage point, and dismantle the monopoly of the current big-wig defense companies. DoD’s outdated procurement process makes entering the U.S. market difficult for new companies. Since the U.S. military relies heavily on nontraditional suppliers to gain an edge over potential adversaries, the Pentagon cannot afford to erect such barriers to entry.
Still, I would be lying if I didn’t conclude that – as a war-focused foreign correspondent, I have some discomfort over the nature of this complex, the damage we do to foreign lands and people, and how often officials dance to cover up the wrongdoings.
We could start dismantling the glaring conflicts of interest. Earlier this year, more than a dozen lawmakers introduced a bipartisan bill banning members of Congress and senior staffers from buying or selling stocks while in office. Such a move is common sense, and the first step is to ensure that wars are not for the profit of a few but at the expense of many.
The jarring truth is that American military prowess is pivotal in today’s ever-changing arena of threats and concerns. It would be lovely to espouse that we have no enemies, but utopian thinking doesn’t make the homeland any safer. We need ingenuity, but we also need transparency and accountability.
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