The Political Economy of U.S. Militarism

This wide-ranging, interdisciplinary analysis blends history, economics, and politics to challenge most of the prevailing accounts of the rise of U.S. militarism. While acknowledging the contributory role of some of the most widely-cited culprits (big oil, neoconservative ideology, the Zionist lobby, and President Bush’s world outlook), this study explores the bigger, but largely submerged, picture: the political economy of war and militarism. The study is unique not only for its thorough examination of the economics of military spending, but also for its careful analysis of a series of closely related topics (petroleum, geopolitics, imperialism, terrorism, religious fundamentalism, the war in Iraq, and the Palestinian-Israeli conflict) that may appear as digressions but, in fact, help shed more light on the main investigation.

Praise

"Ismael Hossein-zadeh's penetrating analysis of the role of the military-industrial complex in driving U.S. foreign policy and rearranging domestic priorities could not be more timely. With U.S. military spending at levels higher than the peak years of the Vietnam War, Hossein-zadeh provides the most cogent explanation yet of how we got to this point."

--William D. Hartung, Senior Research Fellow, World Policy Institute at the New School

 

"America has been overrun not by military force, but by the force of militarism.  Using statistics, analysis and historical references, Hossein-zadeh reveals the troubling picture that America may have succumbed to militarism despite the warnings of Washington, Eisenhower and Butler.  Hossein-zadeh reveals the true cost of Pentagon programs by adjusting the federal budget for Social Security and unmasking the insatiable, consuming maw of spending run amok.  He reveals how budgetary militarism is defeating the New Deal, even as it musters a long term assault on the Bill of Rights and other foundations of American democracy. The Political Economy of U.S. Militarism is a must-read for patriots concerned about the future of the United States."

--Grant F. Smith, Director of Research, Institute for Research, Middle Eastern Policy

 
“Writing in a scholarly but accessible manner, Ismael Hossein-zadeh provides an impressive overview of policy trends, their historical background and their political and economic influences.  In examining the recent tendencies towards war and militaristic responses to foreign policy issues, the author looks past the now dominant neo-conservative justifications, focusing on the powerful interests that lie beneath."

--David Gold, Associate Professor, International Affairs Program, The New School
 
"Ismael Hossein-zadeh has produced an original and powerful synthesis of previous explanations of contemporary U.S. militarism. He locates the relevant economic, political, and ideological forces within a power-elite military-industrial complex framework firmly grounded in a structural analysis of capital accumulation. By steering past the twin dangers of conspiracy theory and economic reductionism, this framework clearly reveals the parasitic, class-biased, and systemic character of the Bush administration’s unilateralism. Along the way, Hossein-zadeh provides a challenging analysis of the cyclical fluctuations of U.S. military spending since World War II."

--Paul Burkett, Professor of Economics, Indiana State University
 

About the Author(s)

Ismael Hossein-zadeh

Ismael Hossein-zadeh is Professor of Economics at Drake University in Des Moines, Iowa. He has previously published one book, Soviet Non-Capitalist Development: The Case of Nasser’s Egypt (1989), and a number of papers on significant topics. Those topics include long waves of economic expansion and decline, economic crises and restructuring policies, currency-trade relations, NAFTA and labor, Third World debt, determinants of presidential economic policies, the political economy of war and military spending, and the roots of conflict between the Muslim world and the West.

Table of Contents

Introduction * The Military-Industrial Giant: An Empire in Itself * Imperial Militarisms: Past and Present * The Rise of U.S. Militarism * Inventing “Threats to Our National Interests” * Militant Islam, Terrorism, and “Clash of Civilizations” * Behind the Invasion of Iraq * Waste, Inefficiency and the Spoils of Military Spending * The Political Economy of U.S. Military Spending * Limits of U.S. Militarism