If the energy lobby is the main beneficiary of the Afghan war, the military-industrial lobby is the big victor of 11 September. Their wildest dreams have been gratified from now on.
Before anything else, the ABM treaty, which set limits on arms development, has been unilaterally denounced by President Bush.
Then, not only was the CIA director not fired after the apparent failure of 11 September, but the agency's budget was immediately increased by 42% in order to put the "World Attack Matrix" into operation.
The US military budget, which had not stopped shrinking since the collapse of the USSR, saw an increase as sudden as it was vertiginous. If you count the extra funds allocated right after the attacks and the predicted increased budget, the first two years of the Bush administration will see a 24% increase in military spending. Over five years, the US military budget will represent more than $2 trillion, even though the arms race is finished and there's no longer any major opponent. The US military budget from now on is equal to the total budgets of the twenty-five largest armies behind it.
The best-equipped posts are those concerning space and secret operations, thus manifesting the new predominance in the American apparatus of state of the alliance between those who run the secret operations (rallied around George Tenet) and the Star Wars partisans, who are gathered around Donald Rumsfeld and Gen. Ralph Eberhart, current NORAD commander-in-chief and the commanding officer who led air-traffic-control operations on 11 September 2001.
The evolution taken by the American administration with the events of 11 September seems to be the harbinger of lots of "blood, sweat, and tears," as Winston Churchill put it. Now it remains to be seen who on the planet will bear the brunt of it.
Paris, 20 February 2002
Washington DC, 11 June 2002
[[END OF EPILOGUE]]
[[This document is part of the English translation of
"L'effroyable imposture."
[[ (c) 2002, Christopher Schroen.
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