Dear Keith.

You can no more "solve" human conflict anymore than you can "solve" crime. As a matter of fact, war can be considered crime on an international level. In the modern context, it usually consists of totalitarians using armed force to acquire land, resources or populations, from other totalitarians, or from the democracies.

The imperative for democracies to have strong militaries was proven in world war 2 where literally dozens of neutral countries were invaded by totalitarian ones. And the USA was an object lesson of why strong militaries were needed. The US army prior to WW2 was almost a joke. It had a total of two WW1 tanks in it's entire inventory. Pacifists like yourself considered tanks to be "offensive" weapons so the USA did not even manufacture tanks. The militaristic Japanese therefore considered that the people of the USA were weak, and could not produce serious warriors to match the Japanese samurai. Their biggest shock to that idea came at the battle of Midway, where an American A-26 bomber pilot deliberately tried to crash his plane onto a Japanese carrier. Most people do not know that the Japs got the kamikaze idea from that self sacrificing American pilot.

You can tell tales about the US military industrial complex and I would agree that it is true that there is gross overcharging, and the creation of weapons for political expediency. But one thing about the US military industrial complex, is that it is creating weapons that are far superior to that of the totalitarians, and that to my mind is a good thing.

There still exists today criminal governments like the Iran regime, Maduro in Venezuela, the Red Chinese and the crazy North Koreans, and these people need to be confronted and be aware of the consequences if they go too far in their internal repressions, or if they seek war with the democracies.

Thinking that a "peace complex" can do anything to alter that is like saying that a pacifist speech could stop a Nazi execution squad.

Small government requires, first and foremost, the dismantling of the one tier of government we can actually do without, and that is the man in the middle, middleman state government, who today in the 21st century are little more than very proactive self-serving completely corrupt roadblocks in the path of real progress.

As the first consequence, costs the taxpayer over 70 billion dollars each and every year, the cost of these useless appendages, and before a single service or amenity is rolled out!

But, can be provided without adding additional staff, by the simultaneous rollout of quite massive regional autonomy, assisted preferred cooperative capitalism! Cooperative capitalism as envisaged. Government funded and facilitated, competing for market share, employee-owned co-ops.

This is, after all, the most efficient and most productive, FREE MARKET, PRIVATE ENTERPRISE, UNION FREE, business model that almost alone survived the great depression largely intact.

Moreover, the only business model that keeps all the profits and tax liabilities onshore and enables the same one dollar to do the economic work of at least seven!

What do we want instead?
Forelock tuggers!
When do we want them?
Now!

And we wonder why we've been going backwards in every sense of the word since the seventies?
Alan B.

Keith check out the very next paragraph in that speech!
Ike also warned about researchers coming to the conclusion that more research was the answer, for that we can thank the current global warming hoax in its many guises. This is costing us huge money wasted, loss of industry and downright fraud! The answer should be a Royal Commission once and for all but we will blunder on same as your peace idea. When will common sense prevail, ever?

Capitalism is forever seeking new opportunities to make a buck, including having to innovate (especially if government subsidies make even that profitable). If your grandmother scratched her backside, some capitalist would quickly invent and market a new long-armed arse-scratcher.

And if many capitalists see a huge new opportunity, whether it actually works or not, such as renewable energy, they would junk their dreadfully-evil coal- and gas-fired plants and hop on the subsidy bus without any regrets. More bucks for Sister A than Sister B ? Sell Sister B to the garment industry and dress up sister A for stardom.

The problem with peace-oriented industry is that there may not be much of a market for it: war-oriented industry pays better, as long as there are wars. And as we know from the genius in the White House, you can always provoke one if you try hard enough. Iran ? Yeah, sure, they're bad guys. North Korea ? Why not, they're not nice. China in the South 'China' Sea ? Sure, one in, all in. With a bit of luck, a.k.a. business acumen, he might get one going with Mexico.

Capitalism is revolutionary, Marx wrote. It sweeps away archaic technologies, societies, people. It constantly innovates and enriches many people, to the tune of billions - and for just an idea, put into production. Where does it stop ? Well, where will Jeff Bezos stop ? He's got onto the idea of selling to the entire world: watch him put Walmart in its grave. And god knows what other companies everywhere. That's capitalism.

No Joe, it's not, but rather extreme capitalism that wants to own the world and enslave the rest of us as well. as captive workers working for as little as poss/slave wages and to add salt into the wound, want us also as their captive market owing more to the company store than you can repay in one lifetime!

Failed communism has also had its day, and as we know, socialism will be resisted to the last breath by corrupt capitalists, many of who have left a trail or ruination in their wake as they built their personal fortunes with other folk's money!?

Wherever possible socialize their losses and privatize the profits.

What both capitalists and socialists refuse steadfastly to look at is, Social credit, where OUR money works exclusively for us at cost and cooperative capitalism, the only free market private enterprise system that sidelines greedy corrupt exploitative "capitalism"! And the union alike, neither of which improve the productivity output or wages and conditions, but rather the very opposite!

Moreover, co-ops not only are the most efficient free market, private enterprise business model. but virtually the only one which keeps OUR MONEY ONSHORE WORKING HERE FOR US AND WHERE GOVERNMENT-FUNDED AND FACILITATED. make one dollar do the economic work of seven!

And the only free market, private enterprise business model to mostly survive the Great Depression, largely intact. And to top it off have never, to my knowledge, grown too big to fail!?

Social credit was the monetary mechanism that created the economic miracle of post-war Japan! And united a completely bankrupt war-torn nation to for a time, recreate it as the world's second largest economy!

If we're going to burn taxpayer's funds subsidising something? Then let it be the above, as a win-win outcome and an investment in ourselves and our future self-reliant prospects, where we own what is ours!
Alan B.

America is of course now a permanent warfare state.
The various essays and books featured on the Tomdispatch site describe the origins of, and the now-time state of the situation.
Meanwhile Eisenhower was very supportive of, and even helped to mastermind the early activities of this now permanent warfare state.
Such is the argument featured in the book by Stephen Kinzer titled The Brothers John Foster and Allen Dulles.