Washington Rules

Washington Rules, America's Path To Permanent War by Andrew J. Bacevich

A scathing critique of America's self anointed role as the savior and policeman of the world, and the American military-political nexus that keeps this sham alive out of self interest.

Bacevich traces the development of the American "national security" institution since the beginning of the Cold War, the Bay of Pigs, through the Vietnam era, the first Gulf War and now the Bush and Obama wars. He spares no president since Eisenhower. He saves his most stinging criticism for JFK. By the time he gets to Bush, he settles for mockery. He ends with expressing his deep disappointment in Obama for just continuing to abide by the sixty year old Washington consensus.

He defines what he calls the "sacred trinity" of American foreign policy as : global military presence, global power projection and global interventionism. The trinity exists to implement the American credo, which "summons the United States - and the US alone - to lead, save, liberate, and ultimately transform the world. He illustrates with a quick review of America's wars in the last 60 years, how this credo is bunk. He shows how America's philosophy of interventionism has always made matters worse, and how the "semi warriors" in Washington never learn from mistakes. In fact, mistakes get erased from memory by revisionist history telling.

He makes an emotional appeal to turn away from the path of permanent war, which is leading the nation into financial ruin, while making it more and more insecure at the same time. He recommends a 'new trinity':

* the purpose of the U.S. military is not to combat evil or remake the world, but to defend the United States and its most vital interests
* the primary duty station of the American soldier is in America
* consistent with Just War tradition, the US should employ force only as a last resort and only in self-defense

Bacevich also argues that "all volunteer" nature of the military is one of the causes for the problem: by relinquishing their obligations and by not paying attention, the American people have let the powers to be to abuse the military toward furthering their imperialistic designs. He argues, if the people want to impose their will on foreign policy, they need to go back to viewing defending their nation as an obligation of every citizen.

If the impending "ship wreck of monumental proportions" is to avoided, the people must make the choice.