The Military-Industrial Complex Can Be Shut Down and Reconverted

The Military-Industrial Complex Can Be Shut Down and Reconverted pdf (128.63 KB)

This article is from Executive Intelligence Review News Service

Dec. 11, 2023—The military-industrial complex is the principal instrumentality by which the British-American financier class can produce, supply or operate weapons which can exact genocide against populations, and destroy the physical underpinnings of the existence of nations.

This dangerous capability must be taken away, with scientifically advanced portions of the military firms reconverted and retooled to produce an array of infrastructure, advanced space programs, the construction of fusion reactors, etc.

Here we present some first approximation findings, which further this task of using the most developed technology to turn swords into plowshares.

The core of the production side of the military-industrial complex is six firms, which we list in order of the revenue they receive from defense and the share of all their revenues that come from defense:

Lockheed Martin, $63.3 billion revenues from defense, 96% of all revenues come from defense;

RTX Corp (formerly Raytheon), $39.6 billion, 59%;

Northrop Grumman, $32.4 billion, 89%;

Boeing, $30.8 billion, 46%;

General Dynamics, $30.4 billion, 77%; and

BAE Systems, $25.2 billion, 96%.

Their combined revenue of $221.7 billion is 37.1 % of the level of world military sales of $597 billion, determined by the Swedish International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI). (More will be forthcoming on the Anglo-American control of these companies.)

For starters, Lockheed Martin produces the Javelin Weapon System, the Long Range Anti-Ship Missile (LRASM), the Precision Strike Missiles, etc. RTX/Raytheon produces the Tomahawk Cruise Missile; the Joint Strike Missile, the MK54 Lightweight Torpedo. The Big 6 produce fighter jets, naval vessels, artillery, etc. They supply 50% and possibly up to 65% or more of all the weapons used by Ukraine.

Consulting with industry sources, EIR has determined that the cost of building a 120-bed hospital is approximately $300 million, while the cost of building a 500-bed or larger hospital, with expanded medical facilities, is approximately $800 million. As for schools, the average cost to build a new school is approximately $45 million (including land acquisition, science labs in high schools, and so forth). Thus far, the Congress has sent $43.6 billion in weapons and military assistance to Ukraine, according to the Council on Foreign Relations, and of the new $61 billion that Biden is demanding to send to Ukraine, about $23 billion is military equipment and assistance. Were this to pass, the total U.S. military equipment and assistance the U.S. would have sent to Ukraine would be $66.6 billion. That would produce 1,480 schools. The U.S. is also sending military equipment to Israel, Taiwan, etc.

Going back a bit earlier, on Oct. 7, 2001, the British-U.S.-NATO forces invaded Afghanistan, less than one month after the Sept. 11, 2001 attacks, without waiting for the time to investigate what country was really behind 9/11. To fund the ensuing illegal, genocidal operations in Afghanistan, Iraq, Libya, Syria, etc.—all efforts that the U.S. lost—Congress set up a fund for essentially foreign wars and invasions, called the Overseas Contingency Operations/Global War on Terrorism (OCO/GWOT) to support overseas U.S. military operations. The OCO/GWOT did not go through normal Congressional approval procedures, so that these illegal foreign wars could take place.

Using Pentagon data, EIR calculated that between fiscal year 2001 and fiscal year 2021, the OCO/GWOT was funded with a total of $2.047 trillion. If that money had not been spent on destructive foreign wars, that ruined each of the attacked countries, that money could have financed a 42,000-mile network of electrified high-speed/maglev rail, at a construction cost of approximately $500 billion, as called for by Lyndon LaRouche; the building of the North American Water and Power Alliance (NAWAPA), at a cost of $400 billion; and set up $200 billion corporations each, modeled on World War II Defense Plants Corporation, for nuclear fission, nuclear fusion, and a Moon-Mars project development; with extra money to build schools, hospitals, clean water provision systems, etc.

All the time, we are told that we can’t build those projects: “They’re impractical. Where are you going to get the money?” We know where: from the MIC.

EIR will next examine the procurement part of the DOD budget, as well as other sections of its budget, like the OCO/GWOT, to see where the shutdown of the war machine, and its reconversion (along with the reconversion of the auto industry) would produce hospitals, schools and a totally new economy, capable of collaborating with the BRICS.