war spending, considered pragmatically, has been a consistently positive factor
in the rise of gross national product and of individual productivity. A former
Secretary of the Army has carefully phrased it for public consumption thus: "If
there is, as I suspect there is, a direct relation between the stimulus of large
defense spending and a substantially increased rate of growth of gross national
product, it quite simply follows that defense spending per se might be
countenanced on economic grounds alone [emphasis added] as a stimulator of
the national metabolism." Actually, the fundamental nonmilitary utility of war
in the economy is far more widely acknowledged than the scarcity of such
affirmations as that quoted above would suggest.
But negatively phrased public recognitions of the importance of war to the
general economy abound. The most familiar example is the effect of "peace
threats" on the stock market, e.g., "Wall Street was shaken yesterday by news of
an apparent peace feeler from North Vietnam, but swiftly recovered its
composure after about an hour of sometimes indiscriminate selling." Savings
banks solicit deposits with similar cautionary slogans, e.g., "If peace breaks out,
will you be ready for it?" A more subtle case in point was the recent refusal of
the Department of Defense to permit the West German government to substitute
nonmilitary goods for unwanted armaments in its purchase commitments from
the United States; the decisive consideration was that the German purchases
should not affect the general (nonmilitary) economy. Other incidental examples
are to be found in the pressures brought to bear on the Department when it
announces plans to close down an obsolete facility (as a "wasteful" form of
"waste"). and in the usual coordination of stepped-up military activities (as in
Vietnam in 1965) with dangerously rising unemployment rates.
Although we do not imply that a substitute for war in the economy cannot be
devised, no combination of techniques for controlling employment, production,
and consumption has yet been tested that can remotely compare to it in
effectiveness. It is, and has been, the essential economic stabilizer of modern
societies.
POLITICAL
The political functions of war have been up to now even more critical to social
stability. It is not surprising, nevertheless, that discussions of economic
conversion for peace tend to fall silent on the matter of political
implementation, and that disarmament scenarios, often sophisticated in their
weighing of international political factors, tend to disregard the political
functions of the war system within individual societies.
in the rise of gross national product and of individual productivity. A former
Secretary of the Army has carefully phrased it for public consumption thus: "If
there is, as I suspect there is, a direct relation between the stimulus of large
defense spending and a substantially increased rate of growth of gross national
product, it quite simply follows that defense spending per se might be
countenanced on economic grounds alone [emphasis added] as a stimulator of
the national metabolism." Actually, the fundamental nonmilitary utility of war
in the economy is far more widely acknowledged than the scarcity of such
affirmations as that quoted above would suggest.
But negatively phrased public recognitions of the importance of war to the
general economy abound. The most familiar example is the effect of "peace
threats" on the stock market, e.g., "Wall Street was shaken yesterday by news of
an apparent peace feeler from North Vietnam, but swiftly recovered its
composure after about an hour of sometimes indiscriminate selling." Savings
banks solicit deposits with similar cautionary slogans, e.g., "If peace breaks out,
will you be ready for it?" A more subtle case in point was the recent refusal of
the Department of Defense to permit the West German government to substitute
nonmilitary goods for unwanted armaments in its purchase commitments from
the United States; the decisive consideration was that the German purchases
should not affect the general (nonmilitary) economy. Other incidental examples
are to be found in the pressures brought to bear on the Department when it
announces plans to close down an obsolete facility (as a "wasteful" form of
"waste"). and in the usual coordination of stepped-up military activities (as in
Vietnam in 1965) with dangerously rising unemployment rates.
Although we do not imply that a substitute for war in the economy cannot be
devised, no combination of techniques for controlling employment, production,
and consumption has yet been tested that can remotely compare to it in
effectiveness. It is, and has been, the essential economic stabilizer of modern
societies.
POLITICAL
The political functions of war have been up to now even more critical to social
stability. It is not surprising, nevertheless, that discussions of economic
conversion for peace tend to fall silent on the matter of political
implementation, and that disarmament scenarios, often sophisticated in their
weighing of international political factors, tend to disregard the political
functions of the war system within individual societies.
