- cross-posted to:
- worldnews@lemmy.ml
- cross-posted to:
- worldnews@lemmy.ml
Defense contractors are forced to ramp up production but want long-term government guarantees of sales.
Business fears that they may expand production, but there will be no demand in three to five years.
Also, the lack of semiconductors and other problems with logistics have led to the fact that the order is three times longer than before the start of the conflict.
I thought we were told that it was all about protecting democracy and a free world, turns out it’s all about money.
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but want long-term government guarantees of sales.
That sounds like asking for a new war
Why do you think US is constantly in a state of war.
Power projection to enforce their unsustainable way of life? But yes, I understand what you mean. Bit surprised to see it so cynically out in the open, though, it is usually veiled with some bs flowery language
Yeah, projecting power over the empire is definitely a big part of it. And agreed, masks are starting to come off in the west, and we’re seeing increasingly more plain language being used to explain how the empire sustains itself.
So, aggression (USA doesn’t defend) contractors want more war?
Specifically, they don’t want to spend a bunch of money creating factories if the war ends soon since they wouldn’t make a profit on that. So, either there’s going to be a long war or they’re not interested.
Shit. The people in charge are psychopathic enough to offer exactly that.
But paradoxically the means to ensure a long war don’t exist because a long war hasn’t been assured.
I think the business press breaking with the “slobber zucchini” crowd means institutional support will break before the arms manufacturers get contracts and assurances.
I think another aspect is that they don’t want to have an actual all out war because that wouldn’t serve the interests of oligarchs either. This is why NATO membership is being dangled in front of Ukraine like a carrot. They know perfectly well that if Ukraine was actually accepted into NATO then it would mean real war with Russia. What they want instead is a proxy war where weapons industry makes money while Russians and Ukrainians do the dying.
And related to that: these contractors have started to get used to selling weapons that aren’t supposed to be used. Millions/billions pumped into r&d with no end in sight. Selling ammunition is profitable but it comes with raw material problems.
Plus the people involved in making the political decision know that people need to get re-elected. The longer the war, the harder that becomes. Wars like Libya and Iraq are roughly short enough for them (far too long for the victims). Wars like Afghanistan can breed resentment in the supporter base. A war for that long against Russia? Risky. If Russia would go along with it for that long. Maybe this is the break that you describe? Is this already happening, do you think?
Selling ammunition is profitable but it comes with raw material problems.
This is kinda funny actually because it mirrors the parasitic working of finance capitalism in the purely industrial one.
In what way?
Financial capital prevailed over industrial because of their high profit margins and the fluidity of their capital. Industrial can’t do that because naturally production require huge investment, time required and logistical effort. All the things in Capital (1st and 3rd volume iirc)
But they still try, as the Redtea mentioned, that’s why in USA for the colossal amount of money spent you get insufferably bloated research projects like the Zumwalt or F35 that often also end in failure, and comparably to expectations and general bugdet, not much actual production of mundane things like munitions.
In a way, US MIC is operating like in the old mercenary philosophy “God, give us 100 years of war but no battles”
So are they basically threatening them with peace? By saying if they don’t have a long war they won’t produce enough weapons to continue said war they want, thus ensuring the war ends?
I absolutely love how western media is at the level of rhetoric where peaceful end of the war as now portrayed as the worst possible thing that can happen.
Even as orders start to pile in, the fear in the industry is that it could expand production only to find that when new facilities open in three or five years’ time, there is no demand. Governments have backtracked on plans before and many European capitals have repeatedly failed to meet NATO targets on stockpiling or the pledge to spend at least 2% of gross domestic product on defense. NATO allies on Friday agreed a firmer commitment to hit the 2% target.
Ugh, last year Mark Esper(*) was in Korea salivating about the 2% defense spending target as well (@18:22), regarding the USA’s Pacific allies and listing off what kind of products he wants them to buy, at a think tank hosted by the Unification Church.
(*) For those unaware of this guy, he’s a former Raytheon “vice president of government relations”/lobbyist turned US Defense Secretary and now once again works for some “defense” manufacturing company (he might be the CEO iirc) while being on multiple think tanks like the Atlantic Council and Council on Foreign Relations and says Asia should have it’s own NATO (the “Quad”), selling it by fearmongering/BSing about China and DPRK
Side note, the forums where these mfs sales pitch this stuff to each other look like something out of a film:
Yeah, the war industry in the west is absolutely wild. It’s like a scene from a Bond movie there. I think the part they’re not taking into account is the unravelling of the economic situation in the west. Forcing countries to ramp up military production will necessarily mean having to do more austerity while people are already starting to get rowdy about their standard of living collapsing. I really expect that the whole NATO and EU money making schemes could end up collapsing in a few years as a result of that. These kinds of grand alliances only work when the going is good. As soon as the economy starts deteriorating you start seeing ladder pulling happening.
Nationalist sentiment is starting to take hold both in Europe and in US. Countries are going to start focusing on protecting their piece of the pie, and they’re not going to want to share what they have left with others. We’ll start seeing old animosities resurface, as is already happening between Poland and Germany, and recriminations over who’s not doing enough. It’s going to be an incredibly toxic environment where no real unity is going to be possible.
