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War Is a Racket is a speech and a 1935 short book by Smedley D. Butler, a retired United States Marine Corps Major General and two-time Medal of Honor recipient. Based on his career military experience, Butler discusses how business interests commercially benefit from warfare.
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A classic anti-war pamphlet by a former Marine Corps general who exposed the profiteering and propaganda behind American wars. Read the full text of his 1935 essay and learn about his life and legacy.
Apr 1, 2003 · Originally printed in 1935, War Is a Racket is General Smedley Butler’s frank speech describing his role as a soldier as nothing more than serving as a puppet for big-business interests. The introduction discusses why General Butler went against the corporate war machine and how he exposed a fascist coup d’etat plot against President ...
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Aug 15, 2007 · Subject: Unique among the high ranking military officers of the US and the world. I do not know of any other high ranking military officer of the US or the world, who has spoken or written such most important truths and facts about the nature and causes of war. General Butler wrote these in simple and direct language that everyone can understand.
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It is possibly the oldest, easily the most profitable, surely the most vicious. It is the only one international in scope. It is the only one in which the profits are reckoned in dollars and the losses in lives.
A racket is best described, I believe, as something that is not what it seems to the majority of the people. Only a small \"inside\" group knows what it is about. It is conducted for the benefit of the very few, at the expense of the very many. Out of war a few people make huge fortunes. Out of war nations acquire additional territory, if they are ...
In the World War [I] a mere handful garnered the profits of the conflict. At least 21,000 new millionaires and billionaires were made in the United States during the World War. That many admitted their huge blood gains in their income tax returns. How many other war millionaires falsified their tax returns no one knows.
This bill renders a horrible accounting. Newly placed gravestones. Mangled bodies. Shattered minds. Broken hearts and homes. Economic instability. Depression and all its attendant miseries. Back-breaking taxation for generations and generations.
Again they are choosing sides. France and Russia met and agreed to stand side by side. Italy and Austria hurried to make a similar agreement. Poland and Germany cast sheep's eyes at each other, forgetting for the nonce [one unique occasion], their dispute over the Polish Corridor.
Of course, for this loss, there would be a compensating profit -- fortunes would be made. Millions and billions of dollars would be piled up. By a few. Munitions makers. Bankers. Ship builders. Manufacturers. Meat packers. Speculators. They would fare well.
The World War, rather our brief participation in it, has cost the United States some $52,000,000,000. Figure it out. That means $400 to every American man, woman, and child. And we haven't paid the debt yet. We are paying it, our children will pay it, and our children's children probably still will be paying the cost of that war. International Nick...
Of course, it isn't put that crudely in war time. It is dressed into speeches about patriotism, love of country, and \"we must all put our shoulders to the wheel,\" but the profits jump and leap and skyrocket -- and are safely pocketed. Let's just take a few examples: Let's group these five, with three smaller companies. The total yearly average pr...
Or Utah Copper. Average of $5,000,000 per year during the 1910-1914 period. Jumped to an average of $21,000,000 yearly profits for the war period.
Oct 1, 2013 · 4.6 1,087 ratings. See all formats and editions. War Is a Racket is the title of two works, a speech and a booklet, by retired US Marine Corps Major General and two-time Medal of Honor recipient Smedley Darlington Butler.
- Smedley Darlington Butler
Feb 26, 2022 · Download or stream the 1931 book by Smedley D. Butler, a former U.S. Marine Corps general and a critic of war. The book argues that war is a racket for the benefit of the few at the expense of the many.
