Defense Department: The War on Terror Has Cost $250M a Day for 16 Years
ibtimes.com
ibtimes.com
"Neoconservatism, which had been around for decades, mixed humanitarian impulses with an almost messianic faith in the transformative virtue of American military force, as well as a deep fear of an outside world seen as threatening and morally compromised.
This ideology stated that authoritarian states were inherently destabilizing and dangerous; that it was both a moral good and a strategic necessity for America to replace those dictatorships with democracy — and to dominate the world as the unquestioned moral and military leader.
Neoconservatism's proponents, for strategic as well as political reasons, would develop an obsession with Saddam Hussein's Iraq. That obsession would, by the end of the decade, congeal into a policy, explicitly stated: regime change.
Their case was always grandly ideological, rooted in highly abstract and untested theories about the nature of the world and America's rightful place in it. Their beliefs were so deeply held that when 9/11 shook the foundations of American foreign policy, they were able to see only validation of their worldview, including their belief in the urgent need to bring democracy to Iraq.
It was this ideological conviction, more than any piece of intelligence or lie told about it, that primarily led America into Iraq. Weapons of mass destruction were the stated justification, but they were never the real reason, nor was bad intelligence."
https://www.vox.com/2016/2/16/11022104/iraq-war-neoconservat...
If that's the criterion then none of the current US military engagements are part of the "war on terror".
That Vox explanation is also BS (as is everything else from Vox). The US has absolutely no issue with propping up authoritarian states, even Islamic fundamentalist ones like Saudi Arabia. The neocons are sales reps for the weapons industry, nothing more, and their members span both US political parties.
"Many Americans have raised legitimate questions about the nature of the threat, about the urgency of action. Why be concerned now? About the link between Iraq developing weapons of terror and the wider war on terror.
...
Over the years Iraq has provided safe haven to terrorists such as Abu Nidal, whose terror organization carried out more than 90 terrorist attacks in 20 countries that killed or injured nearly 900 people, including 12 Americans.
Iraq has also provided safe haven to Abu Abbas, who is responsible for seizing the Achille Lauro and killing an American passenger. And we know that Iraq is continuing to finance terror and gives assistance to groups that use terrorism to undermine Middle East peace.
We know that Iraq and the al-Qaida terrorist network share a common enemy: the United States of America. We know that Iraq and al-Qaida have had high-level contacts that go back a decade."
(The question of how much of this was subsequently found to be true or false is a different one, but a key characteristic of the War On Terror is the use of lies or misleading generalisations to maintain the war)
Oh bollocks.. America (including and especially neocon govts) has routinely and consistently undermined democratic movements around the world whenever they knew the outcome would not be favourable to their interests - Syria in 1949, Iran in 1953, Guatemala 1954, Chile in 1973, Palestine in 2007, Egypt in 2013 ( I will get flak for claiming the last two but they are true).
I'd like to see the actual marginal cost of the war on terror that excludes money that would have been spent on defence anyway (spent anyway rightly or wrongly, this isn't judgement about whether that spending should have gone up, down or flat).
BTW the war against Iraq absolutely was "War on Terror" It was sold as such with "Weapons of Mass Destruction" That justification being entirely false and knowingly to those who made it is beside the point, without the War on Terror existence and used as a justification it is reasonable to assume the Iraq invasion doesn't happen.
[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Military_budget_of_the_United_...
[1] https://www.usgovernmentspending.com/spending_chart_1792_201...
[2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:InflationAdjustedDefenseS...
[3] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:PerCapitaInflationAdjuste...
[EDIT] maybe I need to read better
Even though drugs weren't mentioned, I believe this deserves a rebuttal.
The constitution isn't a list of right we have. The constitution is a list of powers the federal government has. A more accurate point would be that the government isn't explicitly granted the power to regulate drugs in the constitution (which it is not).
Prohibition required a constitutional amendment (18th) and was repealed with another constitutional amendment (21st).
18th: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prohibition_in_the_United_Stat...
21st: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Twenty-first_Amendment_to_the_...
This is why the first marijuana prohibition was in essence a tax act, because the federal government has the right to tax. They came up with a scheme to make the possession of marijuana require a tax and they would never issue tax stamps for it, effectively prohibiting it. Power grabbers are sneaky little bastards.
http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/shows/dope/etc/cron....
Most of the extra-constitutional power the federal government has today was assumed through regulation of inter-state trade (Commerce Clause), which wasn't what it was intended for.