Quotes from Andrew J. Bacevich

In its quest to control an unruly world, the Pentagon—acting in the name of the American people—slices and dices that world into smaller and smaller segments, while neglecting to assess the actual costs and benefits of the persistent meddling that it terms engagement. In this way, the regionalization of U.S. military policy serves to perpetuate sterile thinking.

war is inherently poisonous, giving rise to all sorts of problematic consequences, and that military power is something that democracies ought to treat gingerly.

war had become "a spectacle." It had transformed itself into a kind of "spectator sport," one offering "the added thrill that it is real for someone, but not, happily, for the spectator.

In short, Vietnam had demonstrated that when it came to deciding when to go to war and how to fight, civilians were not to be trusted.

Yet implicit in this consensus were two notable assumptions: first, that the advantages enjoyed by the United States at the end of the Cold War were insuperable and sure to endure; second, that the great majority of Americans, along with any would-be challengers abroad, would comply with the terms of this consensus, coming to the inescapable realization that no real alternative existed.

For American officers, the starting point for retrieving professional legitimacy lay in avoiding altogether future campaigns even remotely similar to Vietnam. As

The Weinberger Doctrine created a series of tests, in essence preconditions for any policy decision that might put American troops into harm's way.

The liberation of Kuwait in 1991 that seemingly redeemed the military profession was also the event that vaulted Powell to the status of national hero.

The marriage of military metaphysics with eschatological ambition is a misbegotten one, contrary to the long-term interests of either the American people or the world beyond our borders.

Given the brief attention span of the American people, the liberation of tiny Kuwait eclipsed the fall of the Berlin Wall as a historical turning point.

if, as seems probable, the effort [the U.S. invasion of Iraq] encounters greater resistance than its architects imagine, our way of life may find itself tested in ways that will make the Vietnam War look like a mere blip in American history. (March 2003)

Call it Westhusing's Theorem: In a democracy, the health of the military professional ethic is inversely proportional to the presence of hired auxiliaries on the battlefield. The pursuit of mammon and the values to which military professionals profess devotion are fundamentally incompatible and irreconcilable. Where profit-and-loss statements govern, devotion to duty, honor, and country inevitably takes a hit.

The question that generals wanted to hear from their civilian masters after Desert Storm was not "What are you doing for us?" but "What can we do for you and the troops?" The

Americans believe in democracy. But their democracy works such that the divide between rich and poor grows ever wider. In America, the winners control an ever-increasing percentage of the nation's wealth. To be a member of the upper class is to have privileges, among them ensuring that it's someone else's kid who is getting shot at in Iraq or Afghanistan. These

Only influence there—prior to any actual decision to intervene—could prevent feckless civilians from committing the nation to wars or quasi-wars not to the military's own liking. In

egregious Iraqi misbehavior

The resulting fractious, at times even dysfunctional, relationship between the top brass and civilian political leaders is one of Washington's dirty little secrets—recognized by all of the inside players, concealed from an electorate that might ask discomfiting questions about who is actually in charge.

History had singled out the United States to play a unique role as the chief instrument for securing the advance of freedom, which found its highest expression in democratic capitalism.

As the writings of Walton and others suggest, many evangelicals view the requirements of U.S. national security in the here-and-now and the final accomplishment of Christ's saving mission at the end of time as closely related if not indistinguishable.

Worldly ambition inhibits true learning. Ask me. I know. A young man in a hurry is nearly uneducable: He knows what he wants and where he's headed; when it comes to looking back or entertaining heretical thoughts, he has neither the time nor the inclination. All that counts is that he is going somewhere. Only as ambition wanes does education become a possibility.

The Abu Ghraib debacle showed American soldiers not as liberators but as tormentors, not as professionals but as sadists getting cheap thrills.

justified the hyperbole. With the ongoing "war" approaching the ten-year mark, the U.S. economy shed a total of 7.9 million jobs in just three years.3 For only the second time since World War II, the official unemployment rate topped 10 percent. The

The self-assigned role of elite institutions in presidential politics is not to decide who will win, but to assess eligibility to compete.

The assumption of more growth providing an eventual remedy to income inequality remained intact. And the United States remained what it had been: a nation in which the needs of corporate capitalism take precedence over the common good.