Eisenhower Military Industrial Complex

Military-Industrial Complex: How did Eisenhower Know? President Dwight D. Eisenhower was not only a successful high-ranking general during WWII and a two-term president, he was also quite insightful and able to diagnose, for lack of a better term, a disease that would grow and spread within the layers of our government through the 50 years following his presidency. Military-Industrial Complex was his label for this disease, and he warned our country during his Farewell Address as the end of his presidency was quickly approaching. “We must guard against the acquisition of unwarranted influence, whether sought or unsought, by the military industrial complex” (Eisenhower, 1961). He saw two American ideals in which the MIC (military-industrial

This triangle-shaped representation has three angles (groups), and each angle supports one another, giving and getting something in return. When looking at how this triangle metaphor actually works, we turn to Open to Debate. Iron triangles, “often termed ‘subgovernments,’ are composed of one or more interest groups working with standing committee/subcommittees (one in the House and another in the Senate) and an agency or department of the executive branch” (Braunwarth, Langenbach, Stewart, Stadelmann, 182). Applying this to the MIC, the three sides of the triangle equate to the following components: the House and Senate subcommittees focused on the Armed Services, the Armed Services, and the Arms Industry. These three factions work together, but each has their own agenda, and their objectives are very different. Where the subcommittees may want a strong military to protect U.S. interests, the Armed Services want to keep or increase their budget, and the arms industry wants to sell their wares to make as much money as possible, all at the expense of the

Let’s look at what happen post 9/11. After it’s devastation, the Department of Homeland Security was created to assist in fighting the “war” against terrorism. The DHS implemented many “strategies” to help fight this war, including increasing airport security. American parents protested that TSA agents were groping their kids, and “(Janet) Napolitano (former DHS Secretary) defiantly retorted that if people did not want their children groped, they should yield and use the unpopular full-body machines – the machines being sold by her predecessor, (Michael) Chertoff” (Turley, 3). These full body scanners, which Chertoff had a hand in getting into the airports, were “heavily criticized (and little tested)”, and were sold by a company which was a client of Chertoff’s consulting agency (Turley, 3). Another example is Dick Cheney. He was the CEO of Halliburton, a company associated with numerous U.S. war scandals, prior to holding the office of Vice-President. How telling is it that “the company (Halliburton) made $217,199 in campaign contributions in 2004, and in the same year was awarded $8 billion in military contracts” (Newton, 229). According to Turley, hundreds of billions of dollars annually go towards the cost of war, the taxpayers’ money flowing into the arms industry’s pocket, and those agencies and contractors are trying to keep it that way. What does