by Jacob G. Hornberger
How often do we hear the claim that American troops defend our
freedoms? The claim is made often by U.S. officials and is echoed far
and wide across the land by television commentators, newspaper
columnists, public-school teachers, and many others. It’s even a
common assertion that emanates on Sundays from many church pulpits.
Unfortunately, it just isn’t so. In fact, the situation is the exact
opposite the troops serve as the primary instrument by which both our
freedoms and well-being are threatened.
Let’s examine the three potential threats to our freedoms and the role
that the troops play in them:
1. Foreign regimes
Every competent military analyst would tell us that the threat of a
foreign invasion and conquest of America is nonexistent. No nation has
the military capability of invading and conquering the United States.
Not China, not Russia, not Iran, not North Korea, not Syria. Not
anyone. To invade the United States with sufficient forces to conquer
and pacify the entire nation would take millions of foreign troops and
tens of thousands of ships and planes to transport them across the
Atlantic or Pacific ocean. No foreign nation has such resources or
military capabilities and no nation will have them for the foreseeable
future.
After all, think about it: the U.S. army, the most powerful military
force in all of history, has not been able to fully conquer such a
small country as Iraq because of the level of domestic resistance to a
foreign invasion.
Imagine the level of military forces that would be needed to conquer
and pacify a country as large and well-armed as the United States.
I repeat: No foreign nation has the military capability to invade the
United States, conquer our country, subjugate our people, and take away
our freedoms. Therefore, the troops are not needed to protect our
freedoms from this nonexistent threat.
2. Terrorists
Despite widespread fears to the contrary, there is no possibility that
terrorists will conquer the United States, take over the government,
and take away our freedoms. At most, they are able to kill thousands of
people, with, say, suicide bombs but they lack the military forces to
subjugate the entire nation or any part of it.
Equally important, while the troops claim that they are protecting us
from theterrorists, it is the troops themselves or, more
precisely, the presidential orders they have loyally carried out
that have engendered the very terrorist threats against which the
troops say they are now needed to protect us.
Think back to 1989 and the years following when the Berlin Wall
fell, East and West Germany were united, Soviet troops withdrew from
Eastern Europe, and the Soviet Union was dismantled. The Pentagon
didn’t know what to do. Unexpectedly, its 50-year-old official enemy
was gone. (The Soviet Union had previously been America’s ally that had
liberated Eastern Europe from Nazi Germany.) With the fall of the
Soviet empire (and, actually, before the fall), the obvious question
arose: Why should the United States continue to have an enormous
standing army and spend billions of dollars in taxpayer money to keep
it in existence?
The Pentagon was in desperate search for a new mission. We can be a big
help in the war on drugs, the Pentagon said. To prove it, U.S. military
forces even shot to death 18-year-old American citizen Esequiel
Hernandez in 1997, as he tended his goats along the U.S.-Mexican
border. We’ll help American businesses compete in the world. We’ll
readjust NATO’s mission to protect Europe from non-Soviet threats.
We’ll protect us from an unsafe world.
Then along came the Pentagon’s old ally, Saddam Hussein, to whom the
United States had even entrusted weapons of mass destruction to use
against the Iranian people, and gave America’s standing army a new
raison d’être. Invading Kuwait over an oil-drilling dispute,
Saddam provided the Pentagon with a new official enemy, one that would
last for more than 10 continuous years.
Obeying presidential orders to attack Iraq in 1991, without the
constitutionally required congressional declaration of war, the troops
ended up killing tens of thousands of Iraqis. Obeying Pentagon orders
to attack Iraq’s water and sewage facilities, the troops accomplished
exactly what Pentagon planners had anticipated spreading deadly
infections and disease among the Iraqi people. Continuing to obey
presidential orders in the years that followed, the troops enforced
what was possibly the most brutal embargo in history, which ended up
contributing to the deaths of hundreds of thousands of Iraqi children,
deaths that U.S. officials said were worth it. Obeying presidential
orders, the troops enforced the illegal no-fly zones over Iraq, which
killed even more Iraqis, including children. Obeying presidential
orders, the troops established themselves on Islamic holy lands with
full knowledge of the anger and resentment that that would produce
among devout Muslims. Obeying presidential orders, the troops invaded
and occupied Iraq without the constitutionally required congressional
declaration of war, killing and maiming tens of thousands of innocent
Iraqis that is, people whose worst crime was to resist the
unlawful invasion of their homeland by a foreign power.
All that death and destruction both pre-9/11 and post-9/11
have given rise to terrible anger and hatred against the United States,
which inspired the pre-9/11 attacks, such as the 1993 attack on the
World Trade Center, the attack on the USS Cole, and the attacks on
overseas U.S. embassies, the 9/11 attacks, and the terrorist threats
our nation faces today.
Through it all, the Pentagon simply echoed the claims of the president
that all the death and destruction and humiliation that the U.S.
government had wreaked on people in the Middle East, as well as its
unconditional military and financial foreign aid to the Israeli
government, had not engendered any adverse feelings in the Middle East
against the United States. Instead, the president and the Pentagon
claimed, the problem was that the terrorists simply hated America for
its freedom and values.
If the American people had dismantled the nation’s standing army when
the Soviet empire was dismantled, the federal government would have
lacked the military means to meddle and intervene in the Middle East
with unconstitutional military operations, sanctions, no-fly zones,
bases, invasions, and occupations. Therefore, there never would have
been the terrorists attacks against the United States and a war on
terrorism for the troops to fight, not to mention the USA PATRIOT Act,
secret search warrants and secret courts, the Padilla doctrine, and
other federal infringements on our rights and freedoms.
Finally, but certainly important, despite being the most powerful
standing army in the world, the U.S. troops were not even able to
protect Americans from terrorist acts, as best evidenced by two
terrorist attacks on the same target the World Trade Center, first in
1993 and then again in 2001.
3. The federal government
As our Founding Fathers understood so well, the primary threat to our
freedom lies with our own government. That’s in fact why we have the
Constitution and the Bill of Rights to protect us and our
freedoms from federal officials. If the federal government did not
constitute such an enormous threat to our freedoms, there would be no
reason to have the Constitution and the Bill of Rights.
Yet, what is the primary means by which a government takes away the
freedoms of its citizenry? Our American ancestors gave us the answer:
its military forces. That is in fact why many of our Founding Fathers
opposed a standing, professional military force in America they
knew not only that such a force would be used to involve the nation in
costly, senseless, and destructive wars abroad but also that government
officials would inevitably use the troops to ensure a compliant and
obedient citizenry at home.
Consider the words of James Madison:
"A standing
military force, with an overgrown Executive will not long be safe
companions to liberty. The means of defense against foreign danger have
been always the instruments of tyranny at home. Among the Romans it was
a standing maxim to excite a war, whenever a revolt was apprehended.
Throughout all Europe, the armies kept up under the pretext of
defending, have enslaved the people."
Here’s how Patrick Henry put it:
"A standing army we
shall have, also, to execute the execrable commands of tyranny; and how
are you to punish them? Will you order them to be punished? Who shall
obey these orders? Will your mace-bearer be a match for a disciplined
regiment?"
Would U.S. troops obey presidential orders to deploy against the
American people and take away our freedoms?
There is no doubt about it. Of course they would, especially if the
president told them that our freedom and national security depended on
it, which he would.
As I suggested in my article,
The
Troops Don’t Support the Constitution, in the United States the
loyalty of the troops is to the president as their supreme commander of
chief, not to the Constitution. Recent evidence of this point, as I
observed in my article, was the willingness of the troops to obey
presidential orders to deploy to Iraq despite the fact that the
president had failed to secure the constitutionally required
congressional declaration of war.
What if the president ordered the troops to deploy across the United
States and to round up terrorists and incarcerate them in military
camps, both here and in Cuba? Again, there can be no doubt that most of
the troops would willingly obey the president’s orders, especially in
the middle of a crisis or emergency because they view themselves
as professional soldiers whose job is to serve the president and not to
question why but simply to do or die.
Another good example of the allegiance that the troops have toward the
president involves the case of U.S. citizen Jose Padilla. Labeling
Padilla a terrorist, the president ordered the troops to take him into
military custody, deny him access to an attorney, and punish him
without a trial and due process of law. The troops obeyed without
question. Do you know any troops who have publicly protested the
Padilla incarceration or who have resigned from the army in protest?
How many have publicly announced, I refuse to participate in the
Padilla incarceration because I took an oath to support and defend the
Constitution?
Indeed, how many of the troops resigned in protest at the president’s
orders to set up a prisoner camp at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, knowing that
the reason he and the Pentagon chose Cuba, rather than the United
States, was precisely to avoid the constraints of the Constitution?
If the troops didn’t protest with respect to Iraq or Padilla or Gitmo,
what is the likelihood they would protest when their commander in chief
ordered them to arrest 100 other Americans terrorists, or 1,000?
I repeat: The troops, from the Pentagon on down, would not disobey
orders of the president to disarm and arrest American terrorists,
especially in the midst of a crisis or emergency.
And even if some were to protest, they would be quickly shunted aside
(probably punished as well) and replaced with those troops whose
allegiance and loyalty to the president would be unquestioned. Now it’s
true that soldiers are supposed to disobey unlawful orders, but as a
practical matter most of the troops are not going to overrule the
judgment of their commander in chief as to what is legal or not. After
all, how many troops involved in the torture and sex-abuse scandal
refused to participate in the wrongdoing, especially since they thought
that it was approved by the higher-ups? Again, how many refused orders
to deploy to Iraq despite the fact that there was no constitutionally
required congressional declaration of war?
Imagine that the president issues the following grave announcement on
national television during prime time: Our nation has come under
another terrorist attack. Our freedoms and our national security are at
stake. I have issued orders to the Joint Chiefs of Staff to immediately
take into custody some 1,000 American terrorists who have been
identified by the FBI as having conspired to commit this dastardly
attack or who have given aid and comfort to the enemy. I have also
ordered the JCS to take all necessary steps to temporarily confiscate
weapons in the areas where these terrorists are believed to be hiding.
These weapons will be returned to the owners once the terrorist threat
has subsided. I am calling on all Americans to support the troops in
these endeavors, just as you are supporting them in their fight against
terrorism in Iraq. We will survive. We will prevail. God bless America.
Now ask yourself: How many of the troops would disobey the orders of
the president given those circumstances, especially if panicked and
terrified Americans and the mainstream press were endorsing his
martial-law orders?
The answer: Almost none would disobey. They would not consider it their
job to determine the constitutionality of the president’s orders. They
would leave that for the courts to decide. Their professional
allegiance and loyalty to their supreme commander in chief would trump
all other considerations, including their oath to support and defend
the Constitution.
Therefore, if the federal government is the primary threat to our
freedom, then so are the troops: their unswerving loyalty to their
commander in chief makes them the primary instrument by which the
federal government is able to destroy or infringe the rights and
freedoms of the citizenry.
The solution
No one can deny that we now live in a nation in which the president
wields, albeit unconstitutionally, the omnipotent power to send the
entire nation into war against another nation and that he has the
means a loyal and obedient army to exercise that power.
President Bush made his position clear prior to his invasion of Iraq,
when he emphasized that while he welcomed the support of Congress in
the event he decided to wage war on Iraq, he didn’t need its approval.
His position was reconfirmed by Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice,
who informed Congress on October 19, 2005, that the commander in chief’
s position was that he did not need the consent of Congress to send the
nation into another war, this time against Syria.
No one can deny that we now live in a nation in which the president
claims the omnipotent power to jail and punish any American citizen
whom the president labels a terrorist, denying him due process of law,
trial by jury, and other constitutional guarantees and that he
has the means a loyal and obedient army to exercise that power.
Thus, as a practical matter the troops serve not as a defender of our
freedoms but instead simply as a loyal and obedient personal army of
the president, ready and prepared to serve him and obey his commands.
It is an army that stands ready to obey the president’s orders to
deploy to any country in the world for any reason he deems fit and
attack, kill, and maim any terrorist who dares to resist the U.S.
invasion of his own country. It is also an army that stands ready to
obey the president’s orders to take into custody any American whom the
commander in chief deems a terrorist and to punish him accordingly.
There is one and only one solution to this threat to our freedoms and
well-being: for the American people to heed the warning of our Founding
Fathers against standing armies before it is too late, and to do what
should have been done at least 15 years ago: dismantle the U.S.
military empire, close all overseas bases, and bring all the troops
home, discharging them into the private sector, where they would
effectively become citizen-soldiers well-trained citizens prepared to
rally to the defense of our nation in the unlikely event of a foreign
invasion of our country. And for the American people to heed the
warning of President Eisenhower against the military-industrial
complex, by shutting down the Pentagon’s enormous domestic military
empire, closing domestic bases, and discharging those troops into the
private sector.
Oh, my gosh, if we did all that, how would our freedoms be protected?
Protected from what? Again, there is no threat of a foreign invasion.
And again, terrorism is not a threat to our freedom. Moreover,
dismantling the standing army would remove the primary means by which
presidents have succeeded in engendering so much anger and hatred
against our nation anger and hatred that in turn have given rise
to the threat of terrorism against our nation. And finally, the worst
threat to our freedom is our own government, and by dismantling the
standing army we would reduce that threat significantly.
What would happen if a foreign nation ever began constructing thousands
of ships and planes and mobilizing millions of people to invade the
United States? The answer to that threat was also provided by our
Founding Fathers: the foreign nation in question would be met by a
nation of free well-armed citizens who would be prepared and willing to
rally quickly to oppose any invasion and conquest of our nation.
Invading a United States filled with well-trained, free men and women
would be much like invading Switzerland like swallowing a
porcupine. Don’t forget that the men and women who currently serve in
the U.S. armed services wouldn’t disappear; instead they would join the
rest of us as citizen-soldiers, people whose fighting skills could be
depended on in the unlikely event our nation were ever threatened by
invasion by a foreign power.
We should also keep in mind the tremendous economic prosperity that
would result from the dismantling of America’s enormous standing army.
Not only would all the taxpayer money that is being used to fund the
standing army be left in the hands of the citizenry for savings and
capital, but all those new people in the private sector would be
producing as well, instead of living off the IRS-provided fruits of
other people’s earnings. Thus, the economic effect would be doubly
positive, and, while weakening the federal government, it would make
our nation stronger.
What about foreign monsters, tyrants, oppressors, and conquerors? The
answer to that was also provided by our Founding Fathers: Our
government would no longer go abroad in search of monsters to destroy,
but foreigners suffering oppression and tyranny would know that there
would always be at least one nation that would accept them the
United States of America. Rather than police the world, Americans would
focus on producing the freest and most prosperous society in history as
a model for the world and to which those who escaped tyranny and
oppression could freely come.
Of course, those Americans who would nonetheless wish to leave their
families and jobs to help oppressed people overseas would still be free
to do so. We should also bear in mind the perverse results of the
federal government’s military empire and overseas interventions. World
War I brought World War II, which brought the Soviet communist
occupation of Eastern Europe, which brought the Cold War, the Korean
War, and the Vietnam War, along with an enormous standing army in our
country. The Middle East interventions and meddling have brought us
terrorism, the war on terrorism, the USA PATRIOT Act, the Padilla
doctrine, military torture and sex abuse, and CIA kidnappings and
renditions to foreign countries for the purpose of proxy torture.
By their fruits, you shall know them.
One vision the vision of militarism and empire will bring
America more violence, death, destruction, impoverishment, and loss of
freedom. The other vision the vision of a limited-government,
constitutional republic with citizen-soldiers would put our
nation back on the right road of peace, prosperity, harmony, and
freedom.
October 22, 2005
Jacob Hornberger is founder and president of The Future of
Freedom Foundation.
Copyright © 2005 Future of Freedom Foundation
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