State of incarceration

The fact that so many Americans are incarcerated, including hundreds of thousands who are a threat to no one, means something is wrong with our criminal justice system and the way we deal with both dangerous criminals and those whose behavior we simply don’t like.” – David Keane, Chairman, The American Conservative Union


For a nation proud of its freedom and obsessed with the status of number one, it is somewhat ironic that what America excels at is just the opposite: building prisons and locking people up. We do far more of both than any other country in the world. Consider:

• The U.S. incarceration rate of 760 per 100,000 people is the highest in the world, ¹⁾ and far exceeds the fifty-year U.S. average of 110 per 100,000 from 1925 through 1975. ²⁾ That incarceration rate does not include more than 100,000 offenders in prison in U.S. territories or U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) facilities. ³⁾
• The U.S., with only four percent of the world's population, has one-fourth of all the world's prisoners. ⁴⁾
• U.S. state and federal prison populations increased by a factor of 4.77 (477 percent) in the 30 year period from 1980 to 2009, ⁵⁾ while the rate adjusted for population- the rate per 100,00 people- increased by a factor of 3.61 (361 percent) ⁶⁾
• U.S. state and federal prison expenditures increased by a factor of 3.7 (370 percent) from 1982 through 2007. ⁷⁾
• The U.S. federal prison population has more than doubled since 1995. ⁸⁾
• Non-violent offenders constitute 60 percent of the U.S. prison and jail population. ⁹⁾
• The U.S. incarceration rate for Latinos is 2.4 times higher, and for African-Americans 6.4 times higher, than for the white prison population. The disparity is even more pronounced when women are removed from the equation. ¹⁰⁾
• The number of people held in U.S. immigration detention, and the cost of that detention, more than doubled from 2005 to 2010. ¹¹⁾

One might think China, with its large population, Communist government and the well-publicized tendencies of its leadership to stomp on human rights, would imprison staggering numbers of people. In fact, with a 2008 population four times larger than the United States, China had an incarcerated population that was only sixty percent of the U.S. ¹²⁾

Or, among Western counterparts, one might theorize the Europeans would also possess prison populations that match or exceed the U.S. In fact, the European Union, with a 2008 population that exceeded the U.S. by some 200 million, held in prison a population only one-fourth that of the U.S. ¹³⁾

Thus, the obvious question: Is American crime that much worse than the rest of the world?

America and Crime

International comparison on crime is complicated by differences in how individual nations view, categorize and report types of crime, but burglary and homicide are two categories where direct comparisons are possible. U.S. burglary rates are essentially comparable to other industrialized nations while the 2010 American homicide rate of 4.8 per 100,000 population remains high versus other industrialized nations. ¹⁴⁾

What is fascinating, however, is that while Americans tend to believe crime rates are rising, in fact they have steadily trended lower, so much so that in 2010, the per-capita rates for serious crime- including murder, rape and robbery- had fallen to a 48-year low. ¹⁵⁾

Why is crime dropping in America? The most popular explanation is tougher sentencing. Laws were passed by Congress and state legislatures in the mid-1980s to enforce minimum penalties for crime, effectively denying discretion to judges when sentencing. In the 1990s, types of mandatory sentencing came into play: for example, the “three strikes and you’re out” laws. Later came the abolition of parole in many states and the federal system, where a parole board could reward good behavior and rehabilitation, in favor of ‘truth-in-sentencing:’ which effectively meant no discretion for parole boards, resulting in mandatory, full-term prison stays. ¹⁶⁾

Certainly tougher sentencing has an impact on crime rates; how much so remains in debate amongst criminologists.

What is not under debate is that tougher sentencing has led to increased rates of incarceration. Carnegie Mellon’s Alfred Blumstein and Allen Beck, Chief of Corrections Statistics for the Bureau of Justice Statistics, studied the marked rise in U.S. prison population growth from 1980 through 1996 and concluded that changes in sentencing policy accounted for 88 percent of the increase, and changes in crime only 12. ¹⁷⁾ In 2008, America reached an unprecedented and troubling landmark: One of every 100 American adults was either in jail or in prison. ¹⁸⁾ It was changes to sentencing policy that was responsible, as a study by the Pew Center for the States explained:

For policy makers, the 1 in 100 milestone was a reminder that state policy choices have driven the rise in prison populations. The explosive prison growth of the past 30 years didn’t happen by accident, and it wasn’t driven primarily by crime rates or broad social and economic forces beyond the reach of state government. It was the direct result of sentencing, release and other correctional policies that determine who goes to prison and how long they stay.” ¹⁹⁾

While we often think of crime in terms of violent and serious incidents, in fact such offenses are only part of the story. No discussion of American crime is complete without mention of illegal drugs. As of 2008, drug offenders accounted for 25 percent of the total U.S. inmate population: up from a mere 10 percent in 1980. ²⁰⁾

The U.S. ‘war in drugs,’ where illegal drug trafficking and usage is criminalized, is viewed with curiosity from many other nations where drugs have been legalized. Such nations wonder why we treat drugs as a law-and-order versus health problem, why we spend vast sums ($40 billion in 2008) trying to curtail the supply, why 1.5 million otherwise mostly law-abiding citizens are arrested as drug offenders, and why one-third of those are imprisoned. ²¹⁾

Whether America should be fighting a ‘drug war’ is an issue for separate discussion, but as America does treat such activity as illegal, we must note that such serves as a significant contributing factor in the nation’s high incarceration rates. A 2009 study by the Justice Policy Institute notes the number of prisoners in state systems due to drug offenses rose by a factor 5.5 (550 percent) over the past 20 years. ²²⁾

Moreover, on the presumption America will continue to criminalize certain types of drugs, we will later examine the cost of incarcerating drug offenders versus cheaper alternatives- notably, probation.

Theories of Just Punishment

Why should offenders go to prison? This was a question asked in a national Public Opinion Strategies poll in September, 2010. The principle answers, from high to low in terms of percentage response, were: protect society, rehabilitate, punish, provide justice to victims, and deterrence. ²³⁾

		These responses mesh well with the ‘theories of just punishment’ described by University of California – Riverside professor John Perry and Stanford University’s Ken Taylor: Intuitively, we think of just punishment as punishment that "fits" the crime. But what exactly does that mean? What does it take for a punishment to “fit” a crime? One way to start answering that question is to ask about the goals or aims of punishment. Suppose you thought that the point of punishment is to deter future crime. In that case, a punishment might be said to fit a crime, if the punish is just harsh enough to change the cost-benefit calculations of potential criminals.

Alternatively, you could think that punishment is about extracting retribution – an eye for an eye. In that case, a punishment would fit a crime, if the pain or harm imposed on the criminal was proportionate to the pain or harm that the criminal imposed on its victim.

It could also be the point of punishment is to rehabilitate the criminal. In that case, the punishment fits the crime only if it helps to make the criminal a better person. But it seems a little odd to think of this as a theory of punishment, exactly. You rehabilitate people by treating them or educating them? You don’t really punish a person when you treat or educate them. At a minimum, punishment requires condemnation. And what about the victim? Isn’t he at least owed some restitution?

Actually, we’ve just introduced two more theories of punishment. The restorative theory of punishment requires the criminal to make restitution for his crimes. The denunciaton theory of punishment says that just punishment should express society’s collective condemnation of the criminal and his acts. ²⁴⁾

Perry and Taylor go on to state,

By any measure -- deterrence, retribution, restitution, rehabilitation or social denunciation -- we suspect our prison system is riddled with moral imperfection. Moreover, it's not at all clear that our prison system has a well-thought out conception of "just" punishment at its core. We suspect the system rests on a hodge-podge of hardly thought out, politically driven practices that respond to panic and fear rather than being the product of deep philosophical reflection on the nature of just punishment.” ²⁵⁾

The implication is one or some combination of these punitive goals drive our system of criminal justice and why people are imprisoned. But what if these concepts of just punishment are not the only reasons people are incarcerated in America? What if other, more sinister motives are in play?

Racism surely plays a role in the American penal system given the discrepancy between white, black and Latino incarceration rates. Consider apartheid South Africa in 1993, which had an incarceration rate for black men of 851 per 100,000 population and which, at that time, was a nation almost universally scorned as racist. However, just eleven years later, the U.S. incarceration rate for black men was 4,919 per 100,000: a whopping 578 percent higher. ²⁶⁾

Likewise, America’s disparity between ethnic percentage rates of incarceration versus percentage of overall population is striking. Perry and Taylor call the prison system “one of the epicenters of racial inequality in America” and note:

African Americans make up roughly twelve percent of our total population, but over forty percent of the prison population. Latinos make up thirteen percent of the total population, but twenty percent of prison inmates… If current trends continue, one-third of all black males and one-sixth of all Latino males will go to prison during their lives, as opposed to one in seventeen white males. ²⁷⁾

Racism is not the only sinister motive behind why so many Americans are in prison, unfortunately.

There is also need for profit.

However distasteful that may be, incarcerating people for profit has indeed managed to establish a homestead in the U.S. penal system, and no issue has shed more light on the problems inherent to private prisons than has illegal immigration.

Immigration and Incarceration

Any poll of hot-button issues in American dialogue for the past decade would include illegal immigration. It’s a matter on which most every citizen has an opinion even if they don’t necessarily understand root causes- which, in the case of Mexican illegal immigrants, is principally economic and stems from America’s own doing. ²⁸⁾ [See Of 'illegals' and corn]

For an illegal immigrant in America, incarceration is increasingly part of the penalty for getting caught.

Illegal immigrants have been one of the principle drivers in ‘making an industry’ of private prisons in America, given immigrants are generally held not in federal, state or local government facilities but rather in privately-held prisons. In 2007, 49 percent of all immigration beds were managed by private firms, whereas only 8 percent of state and federal beds were managed privately. ²⁹⁾ The largest corporations behind these private prisons include Corrections Corporation of America, The GEO Group, and Management and Training Corporation (MTC).

Corrections Corporation of America (CCA) is the largest. CCA’s Washington lobby spent more than $18 million between 1999 and 2009, with most of that between 2003 and 2007 when it averaged $3 million in lobby expenditures per year. ³⁰⁾ Federal agencies lobbied by CCA included the Department of Homeland Security and its Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) division, Department of Justice, Department of Labor, Bureau of Prisons, Bureau of Indian Affairs, and others. The goals in targeting these agencies are obvious: influencing immigration policy, influencing labor regulations (given prisoners are paid extremely low hourly wages, on par with slave labor anywhere else in America or the world), seeking support for greater outsourcing of federal prisoners to private prison systems, the privatization of BIA prisons, etc. ³¹⁾

While these firms actively lobby for passage of laws that directly benefit bottom lines through matters like tax breaks, incentives and shelters, what is reprehensible is that they also lobby for laws that will directly increase the number of people that will be imprisoned.

Lobbying is actually one-third of a potent triad that includes campaign contributions and cozy government relationships; a triad which was carefully designed and cultivated with one strategic goal in mind: more prisons, and more profit. ³²⁾

It becomes more and more galling the more one thinks about it. How ethically inept is a corporation which actively lobbies for stricter immigration laws resulting in the incarceration of more people, where the lobbying is driven simply by a lust for profit motivated by the desire to fill prison beds and/or build more prisons?

It’s like the cart driving the horse: in a rational world, societal needs alone would dictate who is to be imprisoned, not corporate greed.

Arizona’s controversial Senate Bill 1070 is probably the poster-child for corporate influence peddling in search of legislating increased incarceration. Officially called the “Support Our Law Enforcement and Safe Neighborhoods Act”, better known as S.B. 1070, the law gives to the police the power to question anyone whom they believe may be in the country illegally, and to detain anyone who cannot prove they are in the country legally. Beyond the concern racial profiling would be the basis for most stops for questioning, the expected result of enacting the legislation was more people placed in Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) custody: meaning a need for more immigration detention beds. ³³⁾

Interestingly, S.B. 1070 was conceived and drafted at a meeting of the American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC), ³⁴⁾ a conservative organization that has consistently been the source of criticism from groups like Common Cause for legislating policy from behind closed doors. ³⁵⁾ That ALEC meeting included CCA officials, and when the bill was brought to the floor of the Arizona House, 36 representatives co-sponsored: two-thirds of whom were either at the ALEC meeting or were members of ALEC. ³⁶⁾ An investigation by In These Times concluded:

“Some backers of S.B. 1070 are wrapping themselves in the flag all the way to the bank. (Our) investigation shows that the bill’s promoters are as equally dedicated to border politics as they are to promoting the fortunes of private prison companies, like Corrections Corporation of America (CCA) and Geo Group, which stand to reap substantial profits as more undocumented residents end up in jail.” ³⁷⁾

The Problems with Private Prisons

Privatized prisons face many problems that don’t apply to the public prison system.

Franklyly, the very concept of corporations running prisons for profit is dubious given the shareholder-driven incentives to maximize profit invariably lead to cost-cutting measures in matters where skimming the budget is both dangerous and inappropriate.

Take under staffing. When profit is in play, there’s often pressure to do more with less, particularly with personnel. It is one thing if your local Safeway or Target under staffs the check-out line given customers are merely inconvenienced; it is quite another in a prison were both guards and prisoners are subsequently placed at additional and unnecessary risk. Risk may also accrue given the corporate desire to minimize costs may mean that private guards are not trained the same level as government peers.

Salary-wise, private correctional officers are underpaid versus public counterparts. Department of Labor statistics for 2008 showed private guards earning just 75 percent of the median salary of government guards- ³⁸⁾ meaning the best guards likely won’t be working in a private prison if there is choice between the two systems. Turnover rates also tend to be higher for private prison guards: in Texas, one study showed the annual turnover rate for private correctional officers to be more than three times higher than for government peers. ³⁹⁾

Violations of human rights and incidents of violence are also higher in private prisons: more assaults occur, both inmate-on-inmate and inmate-on-staff, versus in public prisons with comparable security levels. ⁴⁰⁾

The Costs of Incarceration.

Nearly $75 billion was spent by federal, state and local governments on corrections in 2008, mostly on incarceration. ⁴¹⁾ Given a 2008 U.S. incarceration rate of 753 per 100,000 population, that means the average cost per inmate was roughly $32,600. And a 2009 study by the Pew Center for the States noted the average daily cost of imprisonment was $78.95. ⁴²⁾

However, these are only the direct costs of imprisoning someone. America’s high incarceration rates affect the economy in other ways, particularly the loss in productivity when people are no longer working due to imprisonment.

Indiana University’s Katherine Beckett and Princeton’s Bruce Western contend that in the short-term, imprisonment lowers U.S. unemployment metrics by removing people from labor force counts, but in the long-term raises unemployment through reducing job prospects for the formerly incarcerated. 43)

Western and the University of Washington’s Becky Pettit subsequently expanded on the matter, noting the adverse economic affect of imprisonment extends beyond ex-convicts to their families, too:

The influence of the penal system on social and economic disadvantage is seen… in the family lives of the formerly incarcerated. The social inequality produced by mass incarceration is sizable and enduring for three main reasons: it is invisible, it is cumulative, and it is intergenerational. The inequality is invisible in the sense that institutionalized populations commonly lie outside our official accounts of economic well-being. Prisoners, though drawn from the lowest rungs in society, appear in no measures of poverty or unemployment. As a result, the full extent of the disadvantage of groups with high incarceration rates is underestimated. The inequality is cumulative because the social and economic penalties that flow from incarceration are accrued by those who already have the weakest economic opportunities. Mass incarceration thus deepens disadvantage and forecloses mobility for the most marginal in society. Finally, carceral inequalities are intergenerational, affecting not just those who go to prison and jail but their families and children, too. ⁴⁴⁾

While no one disputes that violent and chronic offenders must be imprisoned, the Pew study notes incarcerating non-violent offenders does not make sense either economically or in terms of public safety:

“The expense of locking (serious, chronic and violent offenders) up is justified many times over. But for hundreds of thousands of lower-level inmates, incarceration costs taxpayers far more than it saves in prevented crime. And new national and state research shows that we are well past the point of diminishing returns, where more imprisonment will prevent less and less crime… Our ability to keep communities safe depends more than ever upon our ability to better manage offenders on probation and parole.” ⁴⁵⁾

Improving the System

Crime prevention programs have been shown to reduce policing, judicial and penal system costs. A U.S. Bureau of Justice Assistance report states programs encouraging the social development of children, youth and families in reducing delinquent behavior provides returns ranging from $1.06 to $7.16 for every $1 spent, while programs oriented toward reducing opportunities for victimization produce returns ranging from $1.83 to $7.14 for each dollar spent. ⁴⁶⁾

A study by the Center for Economic and Policy Research (CEPR) concluded a one-half reduction in incarceration of non-violent offenders would lower correctional expenditures by $16.9 billion, with $7.6 and $7.2 billion of that going to relieve stressed state and local governments, respectively. Moreover, their review suggested this savings could be achieved with no appreciable deterioration in public safety. ⁴⁷⁾

The 2009 study by The Pew Center for the States notes the primary community-level corrections programs- probation and parole- have seen larger population growth versus prisons yet have seen far smaller budget growth. In fact, for every new dollar received by probation and parole, prisons received seven. The study also notes the huge discrepancy in the average daily cost of supervising a probationer ($3.42) versus the average daily cost of incarcerating someone ($78.95). ⁴⁸⁾ It is why the report described community corrections as “big promise, little support.”


What we see in U.S. criminal punishment is a hand heavy in terms of retribution and deterrence and light in matters of restorative justice: restitution and rehabilitation.

Moreover, for a nation that values money so highly, it is troubling to see so many non-violent offenders locked up given the high cost to society in lost productivity, especially when probation provides a very cost-effective alternative. Fiscally, It is troubling when so little is spent on preventive crime measures given the high return on investment for such programs.

It is troubling to see an American mindset that desires black-and-white, one size fits all sentencing when discretion much better suits the individual and nuanced nature of crime, and it is troubling when offenders are no longer rewarded for good behavior or their work towards rehabilitation.

Perhaps most troubling is an American belief that anything may be privatized, including penal systems; prisons are the perhaps the consummate example of where the private sector cannot do for profit what the public sector does without.

America’s goal of being ‘tough on crime’ is worthwhile as long as the result is sound both fiscally and operationally. However, the cost-benefit ratio of imprisonment versus reduced crime for the current system is well into the realm of diminished returns, and operationally the higher return on rehabilitation and restitution is slighted at the expense of retribution and deterrence. Truly achieving a status of ‘tough on crime’ may mean re-balancing the equation.

As America’s incarceration rates indicate, its penal system is wrought with problems.

However, one of the characteristics of great individuals, and of great nations, is the ability to rationally acknowledge problems and then correct them. Is the United States such a nation?


Footnotes

¹ “OECD Countries with the Highest Incarceration Rates: US and Israel Top List,” Howard Steven Friedman, The Huffington Post, July 29, 2011.
² “10 Statistics You Should Know About Our Prison System,” Criminal Justice USA, May 17, 2011.
³ “One in 31: The Long Reach of American Corrections,” The Pew Center on the States, March, 2009.
⁴ “10 Statistics You Should Know About Our Prison System,” Criminal Justice USA, May 17, 2011.
⁵ “Key Facts at a Glance, Correctional Populations,” U.S. Bureau of Justice Statistics, November 17, 2011.
⁶ “Key Facts at a Glance, Incarceration Rates,” U.S. Bureau of Justice Statistics, November 17, 2011.
⁷ ““Key Facts at a Glance, Direct Expenditures by Justice Function, 1982-2007,” U.S. Bureau of Justice Statistics, November 17, 2011.
⁸ “10 Statistics You Should Know About Our Prison System,” Criminal Justice USA, May 17, 2011.
⁹ “The High Budgetary Cost of Incarceration,” John Schmitt, Chris Warner and Sarika Gupta, Center for Economic and Policy Research, June 2010.
¹⁰ “Incarceration is not an equal opportunity punishment,” Peter Wagner, Prison Policy Initiative, June 28, 2005.
¹¹ “The Influence of the Private Prison Industry in the Immigration Detention Business,” Detention Watch Network, May, 2011.
¹² “The Prison System,” John Perry and Ken Taylor, Philosophy Talk, May 22, 2011. ¹³ Perry and Taylor, ibid.
¹⁴ “Crime in the United States,” Wikipedia, November 11, 2011.
¹⁵ “America’s Serious Crime Rate is Plunging, But Why?,” Chris McGreal, The Guardian, August 21, 2011.
¹⁶ “Justice in Trial, Sentencing and the ‘Tough Crime’ Movement,” The Leadership Conference on Civil Rights, 2011.
¹⁷ “Population Growth in U.S. Prisons, 1980-1996,” Alfred Blumstein and Allen J. Beck, The University of Chicago Press, 1999.
¹⁸ “One in 31: The Long Reach of American Corrections,” The Pew Center on the States, March, 2009.
¹⁹ Pew Center on the States, ibid.
²⁰ “The High Budgetary Cost of Incarceration,” John Schmitt, Chris Warner and Sarika Gupta, Center for Economic and Policy Research, June 2010.
²¹ “Failed states and failed policies: How to stop the drug wars,” The Economist, March 5, 2009.
²² “Pruning Prisons: How Cutting Corrections Can Save Money and Protect Public Safety,” Justice Policy Institute, May, 2009.
²³ “National Research of Public Attitudes on Crime and Punishment,” Public Opinion Strategies, September, 2010.
²⁴ “The Prison System,” John Perry and Ken Taylor, Philosophy Talk, May 22, 2011. ²⁵ Perry and Taylor, ibid.
²⁶ “Incarceration is not an equal opportunity punishment,” Peter Wagner, Prison Policy Initiative, June 28, 2005.
²⁷ “The Prison System,” John Perry and Ken Taylor, Philosophy Talk, May 22, 2011.
²⁸ “Of ‘illegals’ and corn,” Stephen Mitchell, Justice and the Common Good, October 21, 2011.
²⁹ “The Influence of the Private Prison Industry in Immigration Detention,” Detention Watch Network, 2011.
³⁰ Detention Watch Network, ibid.
³¹ Detention Watch Network, ibid.
³² “Gaming the System: How the Political Strategies of Private Prison Companies Promote Ineffective Incarceration Policies,” Justice Policy Institute, June, 2011.
³³ Justice Policy Institute, ibid.
³⁴ Justice Policy Institute, ibid.
³⁵ “Legislating Under the Influence- Money, Power and the American Legislative Exchange Council,” Common Cause, 2011.
³⁶ “Gaming the System: How the Political Strategies of Private Prison Companies Promote Ineffective Incarceration Policies,” Justice Policy Institute, June, 2011.
³⁷ “Corporate Con Game- How the private prison industry helped shape Arizona’s anti-immigrant law,” Beau Hodai, In These Times, June 21, 2010.
³⁸ “A Brief History of Private Prisons in Immigration Detention,” Detention Watch Network, 2008.
³⁹ Detention Watch Network, ibid.
⁴⁰ Detention Watch Network, ibid.
⁴¹ “The High Budgetary Cost of Incarceration,” John Schmitt, Chris Warner and Sarika Gupta, Center for Economic and Policy Research, June 2010.
⁴² “One in 31: The Long Reach of American Corrections,” The Pew Center on the States, March, 2009.
⁴³ “How Unregulated is the U.S. Labor Market? The Penal System as a Labor Market Institution,” Bruce Western and Katherine Beckett, The American Journal of Sociology, Volume 104, Number 4, January, 1999.
⁴⁴ “Incarceration and social inequality,” Bruce Western and Becky Pettit, Daedalus, The American Academy of Arts and Sciences, Vol. 139, Number 3, Summer, 2010.
⁴⁵ “One in 31: The Long Reach of American Corrections,” The Pew Center on the States, March, 2009.
⁴⁶ “Investing Wisely in Crime Prevention- International Experiences,” U.S. Department of Justice, Bureau of Justice Assistance, September, 2000.
⁴⁷ “The High Budgetary Cost of Incarceration,” John Schmitt, Chris Warner and Sarika Gupta, Center for Economic and Policy Research, June 2010.
⁴⁸ “One in 31: The Long Reach of American Corrections,” The Pew Center on the States, March, 2009.

Tough questions for those who send our loved ones to war

We honor American servicemen and women when we ensure the ideals and freedoms they fought for are preserved.


On Veterans Day we honor those who have served in the armed forces, and we contemplate their sacrifice and the cost of our freedom. Perhaps it should also be a time we contemplate the state of the American military: what we ask of it, the cost of what we ask, and the effectiveness of what we get.

It seems the least we may do given it’s our loved ones- or a friend or neighbor down the street- who make the real sacrifices. They are the ones whose lives are on the line.

Here are some of the questions I would ask of those who send our loved ones to war:

Are not defense and national security the stated purposes for our standing army? Presuming an affirmative, what were the real reasons American soldiers were deployed to Afghanistan and Iraq?

Neither country attacked the U.S. nor posed any threat to America, although Afghanistan’s Taliban did provide safe haven for Al Queda, the organization credited with orchestrating the 9-11 attacks. But Al Queda is not a nation-state, and it is nation-states against which war is waged. Acts of terrorism are crimes against humanity, a matter we confront through intelligence, policing and an understanding of and adjustment to underlying causes, like America’s foreign policy which, in the case of 15 relatively affluent young Saudis, was perceived as so unjust they would resort to radical, suicidal violence as a means of protest.

With Iraq, there was no connection to 9-11 nor was any of the pre-war hype, particularly weapons of mass destruction, relevant. However, it was readily apparent that the Bush Administration held substantial geo-political and corporate motives for invading Iraq:

• Intense dislike of the Iraqi dictatorship,
• Desire for control of Iraq’s vast oil resources,
• A need to move military bases out of Saudi Arabia, and
• Corporate profit, where the winners would be those corporations
  • Supplying the means for fighting war,
  • Reconstructing the country, and, of course,
  • Running the post-war economy.

The Iraq War is also distressing from the perspective of ‘just war theory’, given it is difficult find merit in any of the six ‘Jus ad bellum’ premises, which concern the justice of resorting to war in the first place, where all six must be satisfied for war to be ‘just.’

Waging war is arguably humankind’s greatest failing. The toll of war and its waste of human potential, the incalculable cost of the death and destruction, and the indescribable emotional and physical scars that forever remain with those whom survive is such that no rational mind would wish it on anyone, certainly not a loved one… even when presented with the most just of causes. However, in the absence of such, when defense and national security are masks for propelling geo-strategic initiatives and corporate self-interest, then hell hath no fury as the heart angered that those it loves have been endangered due to shallow desires for empire or profit.

If defense is our objective then why do we allow new advancements in military technology to be sold?

Obviously, the answer is corporations and their desire for profit. Let’s use fighter jet technology for illustration: it is invariably sold to allies, necessitating the need to further develop the technology so that America always has the latest and greatest. Except the enhanced technology is also eventually sold, again driving the need for something better, which also gets sold; the result is a vicious, unending cycle whose principle beneficiary is the arms manufacturer.

The problem, when it comes to the America’s self- interest, is that if enhancing security is really the goal then we are certainly better served if technological advancements are kept to ourselves. Raytheon, Lockheed-Martin, Northrop-Grumman, General Dynamics, Bushmaster, Boeing and others will still make a ton of money developing weapon systems because we will pay them handsomely to do it. But, given we paid for it, should it not then reside with us and with us only?

Why does American policy allow such technology to be sold when our security is less for it? Corporate profit should always play second fiddle to our best interests in terms of national security.

Wouldn’t we be more secure if we were not colonizing the world with military bases?

In ‘The Sorrows of Empire’, the late historian Chalmers Johnson described the scale of American military colonization which, at the time of publication, was more than 700 installations around the world, with military personnel located in more than 150 countries- numbers that have since grown. ¹⁾

America’s military colonization derives from World War II where, following the end of fighting, the U.S. had bases on all seven continents stretching nearly pole-to-pole. Officially, the position of the Truman Administration was to retain foreign military bases wherever possible and to acquire new bases if deemed necessary from a geo-strategic perspective. ²⁾ Still, according to James Blaker, former Senior Advisor to the Vice Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff:

“Half the wartime basing structure was gone within two years of V-J Day, and half of what had been maintained until 1947 had been dismantled by 1949” ³⁾

U.S. foreign military bases then increased through the Korean War, decreased thereafter, and went through the same pattern during the Vietnam War. By 1988, America’s footprint of foreign military bases was slightly less than at the end of the Korean War. ⁴⁾

Relinquishing the power of its global military presence is something the U.S. has so far been unwilling to do:

Like all empires, the United States has been extremely reluctant to relinquish any base once acquired. Bases obtained in one war are seen as forward deployment positions for some future war, often involving an entirely new enemy. According to a December 21, 1970 report issued by the Subcommittee on Security Agreements and Commitments Abroad, U.S. Senate Committee on Foreign Relations, “Once an American overseas base is established it takes on a life of its own. Original missions may become outdated but new missions are developed, not only with the intention of keeping the facility going, but often to actually enlarge it. ⁵⁾

Chalmers Johnson, in “Sorrows of Empire,” argued that:

• America has no constitutional charter to police the world,
• America’s military colonization is fiscally unsustainable and, ironically,
• Leaves the United States less secure for it. ⁶⁾

Johnson notes there is often great resentment of our presence on foreign soil, particularly in the local communities where the bases are located, for many reasons including when the Status of Forces Agreements (SOFAs) pressed upon foreign governments by the U.S. are perceived as unjust. In Okinawa, if an American serviceman rapes a local girl or kills someone while driving under the influence, it is more likely that he will be reassigned to a post in a different country than he will undergo trial through the local courts, something the SOFAs are designed to avoid. That land use and other matters of local importance are often decided by foreign will versus local consent also breeds contempt. ⁷⁾

Even more fundamental is the fact that a nation occupying another’s soil is often all that is required to make the occupier less secure. The University of Chicago’s Robert Pape studied every suicide bombing attack in the world from 1980 through 2004 and concluded:

“The central fact is that- overwhelmingly- suicide-terrorist attacks are not driven by religion as much as they are by a clear strategic objective: to compel modern democracies to withdraw military forces from the territory that the terrorists view as their homeland. From Lebanon to Sri Lanka to Chechnya to Kashmir to the West Bank, every major suicide-terrorist campaign—over 95 percent of all the incidents—has had as its central objective to compel a democratic state to withdraw.” ⁸⁾

U.S. occupations were not mentioned in that list, which does not mean America is an exception to the norm. To the contrary, from 1995 through 2004, two-thirds of the world’s suicide attacks were directed at American occupations in countries where the U.S. had stationed large numbers of troops. ⁹⁾

For example, the U.S. dramatically increased its military presence in Saudi Arabia and the Arabian Peninsula following the first Gulf War, which Osama bin Laden consequently used as a powerful recruiting tool for Al Queda. Pape notes:

“bin Laden’s speeches and sermons… begin by calling tremendous attention to the presence of tens of thousands of American combat forces on the Arabian Peninsula.” ¹⁰⁾

Following 9-11 and the buildup and start of the Iraq War, suicide terror attacks increased in Saudi Arabia resulting in numerous Saudi and American military casualties. Interestingly, in the spring of 2003 Washington announced plans to move its U.S. Combined Air Operations Center from the Prince Sultan Air Base in Saudi Arabia to a base in Qatar.

Pape also noted the dramatic rise in suicide-bombings which accompanied the U.S. invasion and occupation of Iraq:

“The evidence shows that the presence of American troops is clearly the pivotal factor driving (Iraqi) suicide terrorism… There is no evidence there were any suicide-terrorist organizations lying in wait in Iraq before our invasion… what is happening is that the suicide terrorists have been produced by the invasion. Before, Iraq never had a suicide-terrorist attack in its history. Never. Since our invasion, suicide terrorism has escalated rapidly with 20 attacks in 2003, 48 in 2004, and over 50 in just the first five months of 2005. Every year that the United States has stationed 150,000 combat troops in Iraq, suicide terrorism has doubled.” ¹¹⁾

How ironic is it that the U.S. now builds foreign military bases in the name of fighting terrorism, yet the very presence of such bases may beget terrorism aimed specifically at getting the U.S. occupiers out?

Note that prior to the ‘war’ on terror, U.S. post-WWII global military basing was largely justified in terms of containing the spread of Communism. Yet, after the fall of the former Soviet Union, an opportunity to ‘scale back’ America’s global military presence with the end of the Cold War was squandered. The primary reasons, hardly ever mentioned by the mainstream media, had little to do with defense or security but rather with geo- and economic self interests:

U.S. global political, economic, and financial power requires the periodic exercise of military power. The other advanced capitalist countries tied into the system have also become reliant on the United States as the main enforcer of the rules of the (Capitalist) game. The positioning of U.S. military bases should therefore be judged not as a purely military phenomenon, but as a mapping out of the U.S.-dominated imperial sphere.

The United States, which has sought to maintain an imperial economic system without formal political controls over the territorial sovereignty of other nations, has employed military bases to exert force against those nations that have sought to either break out of the imperial system altogether, or have attempted to chart an independent course that is perceived as threatening U.S. (geo-political or economic ) self interests. ¹²⁾

In other words:

The projection of U.S. military power into new regions through the establishment of U.S. military bases should not of course be seen simply in terms of direct military ends. They are always used to promote the economic and political objectives of U.S. capitalism. ¹³⁾

That may be the truth, but it won’t make the news: ‘Keeping the world safe for Halliburton’ won’t play in Peoria, or anywhere else, because most Americans would be mad as hell to think their loved ones were deployed for reasons other than our defense or security.

Sadly, Americans have been conditioned to not think of their foreign military bases in terms of an occupation of foreign soil, but the nationals living near those bases see them for exactly what they are, and the footprint of America’s foreign military bases is fertile motivation for potential blowback in the form of additional acts of terrorism-- which places our loved ones who serve at greater risk.

That our loved ones are often protecting corporate self-interests versus matters of true national security is both unconscionable and untenable. Nor can we afford it. It is well past time to demand an end to this aspect of American empire, and to bring our loved ones home.

Why are we spending so much more on our military in comparison to all other nations in the world; why is so much of the federal budget spent on militarization?

The U.S. military budget for 2010 was $698 billion dollars: 14) 5.9 times more than the amount spent by number two China, and almost as much as the next 20 nations combined. ¹⁵⁾ Amazingly, at 43% of world military spending, the U.S. military funding comes relatively close to matching the total spent by all other nations combined. ¹⁶⁾

		Note this budget figure includes operations, all personnel costs (minus Veterans Affairs), and development, maintenance and purchase of arms equipment and facilities for the Army, Navy, Air Force, Marine Corps and Coast Guard. The amount does not include the covert war activities of the C.I.A, the counter-terrorism activities of the F.B.I., N.A.S.A intelligence gathering, the Department of Homeland Security, or nuclear weapons research, maintenance, cleanup and production. 17) Such expenditure is simply irrational and arguably immoral given America’s more important domestic problems. That such a discrepancy exists illustrates the immense power of the corporate lobby of the military-industrial complex.

If America were to reprioritize its federal budget it could solve many of its pressing domestic issues without raising taxes or budget cuts except for the Pentagon, where slashing military spending to 1/4th its current level, if then wisely managed, would enable America to maintain its defense and military supremacy while- paradoxically- increasing its national security.

How? At $174.5 billion, the U.S. still greatly outspends its nearest competitor and still has working for it the world’s largest, and arguably best, arms manufacturers. In terms of security, the Pentagon cuts would necessitate the closure of many U.S. foreign military bases, ending a misguided attempt at empire and signaling to the world a return to a more Rooseveltian foreign policy: of once again “speaking softly while (still) carrying a big stick.”

The Pentagon cut would mean significant layoffs to both private and public-sector defense workers, but the impact would, by and large, negatively affect one industry sector while greatly benefitting many others. In essence, such a budget re-prioritization would represent a re-balancing of American societal needs, and would likely result in a rejuvenation of America.

What could we do with $523.5 billion?

We could more adequately fund public education. One year of that money would build more than 10,200 completely new K-12 school systems, ¹⁸⁾ or we could seek out exceptional new teachers, hire them at $75,000 yearly salaries (well above the national average of approximately $42,000), throw in another $15,000 for benefits and still employ 5.8 million new teachers. ¹⁹⁾

We could also get serious about upgrading America’s decaying infrastructure of roads and bridges. The American Society of Civil Engineers (ASCE) estimates an annual expenditure of $186 billion, rather than the current $70 billion, is required in order to substantially improve the nation’s roads. More than one in four U.S. bridges is either structurally deficient or functionally obsolete and requires an annual outlay of $17 billion, versus the current $10.5, if we wish to see significant improvement. Worse, virtually every other aspect of the nation’s infrastructure- levees, dams, railroads, transit, schools, solid waste and wastewater treatment plants, and the nation’s electrical grid- get a below average or failing grade from the ASCE. ²⁰⁾

Frankly, there are many ways America could achieve a higher return-on-investment on funds currently allocated to the military budget: money that resembles, actually, a government subsidy. Is the American taxpayer really subsidizing the military-industrial complex at the expense of its greater societal needs? It surely seems so.


On this day, what we ask of the American military, the cost of what we ask, and the effectiveness of what we get certainly seem like questions well worth asking. While our thoughts concentrate on our veterans, it is because of them- and what they’ve sacrificed- that we must ask such questions. Democracy demands no less.

After all, freedom isn’t won solely on the battlefield; there is an ebb and flow to our freedom that results from our ongoing domestic struggles. Freedom thrives whenever the will of the people ensures their government leadership and courts adhere to public opinion, whenever societal common good trumps corporate self-interest, and whenever America’s efforts reflect the higher road of values to which we aspire.


Footnotes

¹ “The Sorrows of Empire- Militarism, Secrecy, and the End of the Republic,” Chalmers Johnson, Metropolitan Books, Henry Holt and Company, New York, 2004.
² “U.S. Military Bases and Empire,” Editors, Monthly Review, Volume 53, Issue 10, March, 2002.
³ Monthly Review, ibid.
⁴ Monthly Review, ibid.
⁵ Monthly Review, ibid.
⁶ “The Sorrows of Empire- Militarism, Secrecy, and the End of the Republic,” Chalmers Johnson, Metropolitan Books, Henry Holt and Company, New York, 2004.
⁷ Johnson, ibid.
⁸ “The Logic of Suicide Terrorism,” Robert Pape, The American Conservative, July 18, 2005.
⁹ Robert Pape, ibid.
¹⁰ Robert Pape, ibid.
¹¹ Robert Pape, ibid,
¹² “U.S. Military Bases and Empire,” Editors, Monthly Review, Volume 53, Issue 10, March, 2002.
¹³ Monthly Review, ibid.
¹⁴ “Military Budget of the United States, Budget for 2010,” Wikipedia, November 7, 2011.
¹⁵ “SIPRI Yearbook 2011, Armaments, Disarmament and International Security, Summary” Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI), 2011.
¹⁶ “World Military Spending,” Global Issues, May 2, 2011.
¹⁷ “Military Budget of the United States, Budget for 2010,” Wikipedia, November 7, 2011.
¹⁸ “Average Construction Cost for Elementary, Middle and High Schools, 2010,” National Clearinghouse for Educational Facilities, November 9, 2011. -- Based on 2010 median national cost per student for construction of elementary, middle and high schools for K-12 systems with average class size of 200 students (3,600 total enrollment).
¹⁹ Basic math.
²⁰ “The 2009 Report Card for America’s Infrastructure, Executive Summary,” The American Society of Civil Engineers (ASCE), 2010.