War is a racket
Brilliantly outlines who profits and who looses from, loosing the dogs of war. A scathing critique on the nature of politics and war profits. Revealing truths about the use of propaganda by war profiteers, and the lack of support for those whose backs are broken by the war machine. This should be required reading for all those who view public office as a fruit machine.
Stats for nerds
50recommend
170mentions
146people
2010–2026years
32% recommend68% neutral
Mentions per year
What Hacker News says
- Yes
There are no non-corrupt government contractors if for no other reason then the government contracting market is not a open and free market it is regulated specifically by the federal acquisitions regulation which was in large part written and consistently adjusted by non-elected corporate leaders: https://www.jacksonlewis.com/insights/dod-seeks-contractors-...
Read war is a racket and it will be clear: https://archive.org/details/WarIsARacket
- Read "War is a Racket" by Smedley Butler for the first person account, "Gangsters of Capitalism" for the third person.
- There is a straight line from Eisenhower’s farewell speech about the perils of the military industrial complex to where we are right now.
Read that speech. Read “War is a racket” by Smedly Butler.
Do you think it’s a good thing that Palantir execs (Shankar and Bob Mcgrew, now at openAI) have been made Lt Cols of the U.S. Army?
They aren’t just making guns or information systems. They’re running the show and profiting on it.
https://www.npr.org/2025/07/03/1255164460/1a-army-07-03-2025
- Smedley Butler - War is a Racket. Good quick read.
- Sue for peace? All wars are a racket meant to benefit the military industrial complex and corporations - Major General Smedley D. Butler spelled this out for all of us quite clearly in his book War is a Racket.
The war in Ukraine is no exception, and has been in the works for decades (since the collapse of the soviet union at the very least, if not longer). IFM structural adjustments and World Bank loans destabilized the nation. When Ukraine wanted Russia to bankroll their loan instead of the IMF, a CIA-backed coup known as Euromaidan followed and kicked the entire conflict off in 2013/14. Again - I'm not excusing Russia here, obviously they escalated the situation with the invasion, but wars can't be viewed in a vacuum.
I know that most people don't want to discuss the actual reasons the war started and is being fought, and instead want to go with the reductionist and feel-good, Russia bad Ukraine good logic. As I said in another comment, there are no good guys in corrupt and evil wars and the war in Ukraine is definitely one of those.
- Do you know what the difference between an assurance and a guarantee is? There was no formal treaty declared. Russia could say that Ukraine violated provisions in the agreements, and has said so. Who is right?
It actually is quite complicated, but you choose to reduce the situation to black and white. There's unlikely to be peace by design - because the war isn't about Ukrainian sovereignty it's about genociding slavs on both sides of the conflict.
You clearly haven't read the book War is a Racket, which is why you don't understand that all wars - including the one in Ukraine - are fought to benefit a select few at the expense of the populations of the nations involved. Your proposed solution for stopping the war is a non-starter because that's not how wars work - it's delusional to think it would ever happen.
