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- iHaveNet.com: Politics
by Caitlin Huey-Burns
William Hartung discusses Congress, Lockheed Martin, and what we can learn from Eisenhower's farewell address
Fifty years ago this month, President Dwight D. Eisenhower, in his farewell address to Americans,
cautioned that the "military-industrial complex" must never be allowed to "endanger our liberties or democratic
processes." Despite his warning, William Hartungcargues, defense contractors like
Describe the military-industrial complex.
It's really about the conjunction between the military itself, the weapons contractors, and in some degree the
What is
It's the biggest Pentagon contractor. They got
What is positive about the company?
They made the U2 spy plane, which helped the U.S. keep tabs on the Soviet Union in the 1950s. They built the C-130 transport plane, which has become sort of the bread-and-butter reliable aircraft for the U.S. armed forces going back decades. They helped with organizing the census. They are an important company, certainly necessary to the defense of the county. My concern in the book is just about their lobbying power, and does it distort our national security priorities? And also, given its size, can we keep it accountable in terms of costs and reliability of weapons programs performing as advertised?
What kind of impact do defense contractors have on foreign policy?
They actually help to finance think tanks that then advocate policies -- whether it be regime change in Iraq or a different approach to nuclear weapons policy -- that, if pursued, would be of benefit to the company. Then there's the relationship with
How will the new
One thing that might happen with the new
What can
The companies cry wolf in certain moments about how changes in procurement or other spending are going to affect the company. Generally, a company like
What surprised you writing this book?
The scope of operations of the company. They've engaged in things like helping to reform the justice system in Liberia, lending people to help write the Afghan constitution, hiring interrogators for Guantanamo. Every time I turn around,
What will surprise readers?
The arc of the company. The fact that they started out as a couple of brothers in a garage. They grew to be the biggest weapons contractor in history. And through that history, they seem to be involved in many of the most difficult -- and, in some cases, corrupt -- practices of the industry.
What would Eisenhower say about the military-industrial complex today?
He'd be amazed that you have a company like
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