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Of the range of issues covered by these authors, the most important is American militarism. It is the handmaiden and unavoidable consequence of U.S. imperialism, which alienates peoples and nations around the world. We were warned against it by George Washington in his farewell address ("Overgrown military establishments are under any form of government inauspicious to liberty, and are to be regarded as particularly hostile to Republican liberty," 1796) and by Dwight Eisenhower in his farewell address ("In the councils of government, we must guard against the acquisition of unwarranted influence, whether sought or unsought, by the military-industrial complex," 1961). Militarism accelerates the hollowing out of American democracy, and, as Bacevich puts it, "If history is any guide, it will end in bankruptcy, moral as well as economic, and in abject failure."
One need look no further than President Bush's proposed budget for 2006, in which he cuts civilian expenditures across the board but raises outlays for the military to a record $419.3 billion – not including costs of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, spending on nuclear weapons or support of our retired and wounded veterans. This calamitous state of affairs threatens not only our own lives but is capable of inflicting unimaginable harm on the rest of the world.
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