-------------------------
Via Workers World News Service
Reprinted from the Feb.1, 1996
issue of Workers World newspaper
-------------------------
The top economic ministers of capitalism met Jan. 20 in Paris. Their task: try to assure the rich ruling classes that the storm clouds on the horizon are nothing to worry about.
The global capitalist economic slump was the main topic of discussion at the Paris meeting of leading financial officials of the seven big imperialist powers--the United States, Germany, Japan, Britain, France, Italy and Canada-- the Group of Seven, or G7.
The next day, a small headline in the New York Times read "Rich Nations See Slowdown In Economies As Temporary."
The G7 officials offered many explanations for the capitalist slump. But none touched on the fundamental causes.
In their statements to the media the capitalist ministers never mentioned the rise of militarism and growing inter- imperialist rivalry. It's a forbidden topic for public discussion.
The vast expenditures to maintain the military and other repressive forces of the state have become uncontrollable. They are the reason for the instability of the dollar. They are the source of the budget deficit in Washington. And they are a factor in the expanding U.S. military occupation of the Balkans.
U.S. military expenditures continue to grow. According to the Center for Defense Information, between 1948 and 1991 U.S. military spending averaged $291 billion a year.
And the military plans endorsed by the supposedly budget- conscious Congress and the White House will add up to more than $1.6 trillion over the next six years, the CDI says.
In imperialism's early years, huge military expenditures bought military victories. The imperialist powers "won" sources of raw materials and markets by seizing territory outright.
Competition between the imperialist powers for control of markets and resources led to two world wars.
But things have changed since the end of World War II. Military expenditures are increasing--even at a time of budget reductions--but there are no corresponding victories.
From a broad economic point of view, building an aircraft carrier or cruise missile system may pay for itself if it enables U.S. finance capitalists to grab new markets to exploit, or to seize material resources like oil or take over sales territories from competing rivals around the world.
Since the Korean war, U.S. military expansion has failed to bring back the returns in super-profits necessary to support military expansion. Under capitalism, an enterprise must generate a profit. By this measure, the military has not been a profitable venture.
Even the so-called victory over Iraq failed to seize much of that country's vast oil wealth, though it did manage to steal some key oil fields.
Consider the cost of one aircraft carrier: $3.4 billion. But aircraft carriers have no economic value to the ruling class unless they are used in a war of aggression in which U.S. forces are victorious and take control of the economic resources for exploitation by U.S. finance capital.
The chief purchaser of military goods is the government in Washington. In fact, the government and the military- industrial-technological complex have become completely intertwined.
Workers World Party leader Sam Marcy points out in his book "Generals Over the White House" that the domination of the government by the forces of the military "grows out of the evolution of the fusion of the military with the industrial and banking complex."
This more than anything else explains the drive to imperialist war. With $1.6 trillion being spent on the military, it is inconceivable that the military will remain idle. Not if it's left up to the Pentagon.
Only the independent intervention of the working class can reverse this situation and end the widening threat of war and economic crisis.
- END -
(Copyright Workers World Service: Permission to reprint granted if source is cited. For more information contact Workers World, 55 W. 17 St., NY, NY 10011; via e-mail: ww@wwpublish.com. For subscription info send message to: ww-info@wwpublish.com.)