The early 20th century progressive, Randolph Silliman Bourne concluded from his direct observations of World War I that “war is the health of the state”.

But why should this be so?

The fundamental, defining characteristic of the “state”, or government, if you will, is that it is the only social institution mandated by some overriding combination of acceptance and/or acquiescence amoungst the populace that it’s use of force to impose it’s will is legitimate.

In war, the government, therefore, is most comfortably in it’s element.

In keeping with the season, one particular event is most poignant and pertinent.

These videos bring the feeling of the event to life…

But moving past the emotional resonance for those of us in the anti-war movement, what objective, rational and dispassionate lessons may we draw from this event for our current situation?

That the military-industrial-complex succeeds in consuming 54% of our federal income taxes and 41.5% of world military expenditures due to the advantage it enjoys from it’s unique consistency with the nature of the institution engaged in the expenditures.

“Of all the enemies to public liberty war is, perhaps, the most to be dreaded because it comprises and develops the germ of every other. War is the parent of armies; from these proceed debts and taxes … known instruments for bringing the many under the domination of the few.… No nation could preserve its freedom in the midst of continual warfare.”

— James Madison, Political Observations, 1795

Warfare, after all, is the unfettered essence of the application of force.

That while war may be against the interests of the general populace of both the aggressor nation and it’s victim, war is pursued in the interests of those who profit from war, as they experience the strongest motivation to take controlling influence over those in position of authority.

And that it is not “greed” or “profit motive” that is the evil we see manifest. But rather, the easy expansion of authority brought on by the determination to employ the force of government to achieve specific economic outcomes.

If we paint a scenario of strict limitations on the application of governmental authority…

we should demand that the overwhelming coercive power of government, (which is, again, it’s most fundamental, distinct and defining characteristic) be limited in regards to economic matters to the enforcement of contracts and the prosecution of fraud, theft and their derivatives.

And the defense of the nation from tangible threat—the presumption that alien social structures on the other side of the world are of necessity dangerously hostile too far-a-field to be taken seriously.

President Obama’s assertion of his crime against the people of Afghanistan being a “war of necessity” and his repudiation of peace as a social strategy in Oslo should be viewed in this light.

And a government held fast and unyieldingly to those strict limitations on it’s economic involvement would leave the “evils” of “greed”, “selfishness” and profit motive no outlet other than the production of the products and services the people demand.

Greed and profit motive perhaps not so evil after all.

And the true seat of social evil, statism, exposed.

—The Bikemessenger