The New Face of War

http://www.counterpunch.org/hallinan05272011.html

The assassination of al-Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden did more than knock off America's Public Enemy Number One, it formalized a new kind of warfare, where sovereignty is irrelevant, armies tangential, and decisions are secret. It is, in the words of counterinsurgency expert John Nagl, "an astounding change in the nature of warfare."

It is also one that requires a vast intelligence apparatus, one that now constitute almost a fourth arm of government that most Americans are almost completely unaware of. Yet, according to the Washington Post, this empire includes some 1,271 government agencies and 1,931 private companies in more than 10, 000 locations across the country, with a budget last year of at least $80.1 billion.

"At the heart of this new warfare," notes the Financial Times," is high-tech cooperation between intelligence agencies and the military" that blurs the traditional borders between civilians and the armed forces. And it fits with the U.S.'s penchant for waging war with robots and covert Special Forces.

But, by definition, the secrecy at the core of the "new warfare" removes decisions about war and peace from the public realm and relegates them to secure rooms in the White House or clandestine bases in the Hindu Kush. When the Blackhawk helicopters slipped through Pakistani airspace, they did more than execute one of America's greatest bugbears, they essentially said another country's sovereignty was no longer relevant and consigned Congress to the role of spectator.

More at the link --

IOW, our government is no longer our government.

"where sovereignty is irrelevant" but I see this "loss of sovereignty war" being increasingly waged by the corporate controlled government against the American Peoples' bodies and that's why we pursue creations like this.



I have a bridge in Brooklyn for sale to anyone that believes such a device were it perfected or even believed to be perfected would only be waged against terrorists or people about to commit violence in the future.



Meanwhile health care, the environment, education, the nation's infrastructure and renewable, sustainable energy development, take a back seat to the art of waging war, surveillance and detection, it's as if the corporate controlled government knew that environmental collapse was coming but instead of seriously trying to change, evolve and adapt society in a holistic manner, decided that staying the course and preparing to wage war against its' own citizens when it all hits the fan is the path to be taken.

Thanks for the thread, Donnachaidh

And now, instead of mounting barbèd steeds
To fright the souls of fearful adversaries,
He capers nimbly in a lady's chamber
To the lascivious pleasing of a lute.

I know it references the peace after the Wars of the roses, but somehow it seems just as apt. Generals and weapon makers stroke the egos of politicians and oil the wheels of re-election efforts.