United States Armed Forces

"I had a childhood fascination with the Army...The Sikh concept of standing up for the weak and defending the defenseless is very much at the core of the Sikh psyche, and those are same ideals that the U.S. Army upholds."

"Today's soldiers, and the democratic fallen, now occupy a prominent place in a long tradition of American liberators, extending from the American Revolution to Operations Enduring Freedom and Iraqi Freedom. The Civil War was a touchstone in this legacy. Academic historians write that it was about sectionalism, or economics, or politics. These may have been its sources, but Abraham Lincoln knew what lay at its core, and stated as much in his Second Inaugural Address, before the conflict, slavery 'constituted a peculiar and powerful interest. All knew that this interest was, somehow, the cause of the war'. Union soldiers fought to preserve the Union, but also to end human bondage."

"It is as Americans that we express our concern with the growing confusion that threatens the security and stability of our country."

"The story starts March 18, 2019, in a big Air Force combat operations center in Al Udeid in Qatar. And there we have, it almost looks like mission command for NASA. You have banks of computers, big screens, all of them watching the air war against the Islamic State... on this day, a lot of people in the command center are watching a drone that was flying up overhead. Now, what they saw was a field that was just littered with a tangle of cars and makeshift tents of debris of the leftovers from weeks of combat. But also within there was a lot of people. And the drone hovered over and focused in on a group of women and children who had found refuge down by the river against a steep sand bank. The drone, it lingered for several minutes, slowly circling with its cameras focused on these folks, either sleeping or just laying down low to take cover from whatever combat might be coming. And the people in the operation center were calmly watching this when, suddenly... an American F-15 attack jet came right through and dropped a large bomb dead center into this group of women and children... killing nearly all of them."

"There are rules for when you can hit a target. And a lot of times, the people that decide whether those rules are being followed are in some command center somewhere. And they’re going to go through it, and they’re going to give you a thumbs up or a thumbs down. But there is a way that you can skip all of that oversight very quickly by saying that you’re under imminent threat, and you need to defend yourself. Under the law of war, that is always allowed. And that allowed the task force to skip all of the officers, all of the oversight, all of the lawyers that had rule books, and talk directly to the aircraft that were going to hit their target. And so, they could hit what they wanted to, essentially, with no one second guessing them....But what people in the operation center started seeing was that Task Force 9 seemed to be using this justification almost all of the time."

"I think that there are people in the military that really want there to be accountability and have worked hard to try and ensure that there’s accountability. But the system that they’ve created is still so flawed that it doesn’t really tell us anything meaningful about how many civilians were actually killed. I mean, think about it. Here was a case where 70 people were killed. And they were killed in front of a high definition color drone camera that lots of military people saw. It was immediately reported, and then it was reported again and again. And the system was unable to respond in any logical way. I mean, if the system can’t handle something as obvious as that, what can it handle?"

"In my opinion, we must have an armed force sufficiently large to repel any attack which might be made. If the possible attackers in the future build up instruments of war which might be used against us, we must build faster. Can we permanently maintain our naval forces at their increased strength, and an army of seven hundred fifty thousand men, with 1, 250,000 reserves by voluntary enlistment, without compelling men to serve against their will? Surely, as a permanent policy, the question answers itself. It is only a question of making the service sufficiently attractive. We seem to be assuming that it is a sacrifice to go into the Army; that it is the most unpleasant occupation in the United States, and one which every boy instinctively avoids. That should be far from the case. In time of war the Army is dangerous; but if we prepare adequately we should not be at war, and the Army for the most part is a peacetime, highly specialized occupation, with only a chance of danger. Experience shows that men do not avoid an occupation because there is a chance of danger. There are dangerous civilian occupations—work with high-tension wires, work in tunnel construction, work in coal mines—and there is never any difficulty in finding men interested in those occupations. The Army has many advantages—a clean and regular life without responsibility, an attraction in the very discipline and order which appeals to some men and offends others very greatly. There are few occupations in which men could be induced to volunteer for $21 a month, and yet today we are enlisting, over twenty-five thousand men a month. In July we enlisted over thirty thousand. The voluntary-enlistment plan has not broken down. In spite of inadequate pay and three-year enlistments, it has accomplished everything which has been asked of it. Up to this time Congress has not even declared that a larger army is necessary. We can hardly blame the enlistment system for not providing an army which we have not actually authorized. No appeal has been made by the President for enlistment. Surely a general campaign led by the President, and organized on a voluntary basis throughout the United States, can secure even half a million men if that many should be necessary. There are many million men unemployed."

"To a foreigner, the United States’ military might is a defining national characteristic."

"The current strength of the U.S. Army and Marine Corps are about 510,000 and 180,000 respectively. In addition, there are about 800,000 National Guard and Reserve troops available to the Army and Marine Corps. Though these numbers suggest the U.S. has bout 1.5 million total ground troops available, the U.S. has many commitments that limits strength for any single military event. Considering the needs for institutional support, U.S. commitments to Europe and Korea, and the rest, retraining, and re-equipping of forces, the U.S. probably has no more than 250,000 active duty troops available for a ground war. If the National Guard and Reserves were fully mobilized, then the U.S. could potentially put a million soldiers in the field for a campaign."

"The Continental Army exhibited a degree of integration not reached by the American army again for 200 years, until after World War II."

"There shall be equality of treatment and opportunity for all persons in the armed services without regard to race, color, religion or national origin."

"We have achieved a world leadership which does not depend solely upon our military and naval might."

"By every measure, the Pentagon is the largest institutional user of petroleum products and energy … Yet, the Pentagon has a blanket exemption in all international climate agreements … Any talk of climate change which does not include the military is nothing but hot air... It’s a loophole [in the Kyoto Convention on Climate Change] big enough to drive a tank through, according to the report ” A Climate of War.” In 1940, the US military consumed one percent of the country’s total energy usage; by the end of World War II, the military’s share rose to 29 percent....Militarism is the most oil-exhaustive activity on the planet, growing more so with faster, bigger, more fuel-guzzling planes, tanks and naval vessels employed in more intensive air and ground wars. At the outset of the Iraq war in March 2003, the Army estimated it would need more than 40 million gallons of gasoline for three weeks of combat, exceeding the total quantity used by all Allied forces in the four years of World War 1. Among the Army’s armamentarium were 2,000 staunch M-1 Abrams tanks fired up for the war and burning 250 gallons of fuel per hour."

"The US Air Force (USAF) is the single largest consumer of jet fuel in the world... the F-4 Phantom Fighter burns more than 1,600 gallons of jet fuel per hour and peaks at 14,400 gallons per hour at supersonic speeds. The B-52 Stratocruiser, with eight jet engines, guzzles 55 gallons per minute... A quarter of the world’s jet fuel feeds the USAF fleet of flying killing machines; in 2006, they consumed... an astounding 2.6 billion gallons."

"The (US) military reports no climate change emissions to any national or international body, thanks to US arm-twisting during the 1997 negotiations of the first international accord to limit global warming emissions, the Kyoto Protocol on Climate Change. To protect the military from any curbs on their activities, the United States demanded and won exemption from emission limits on “bunker” fuels (dense, heavy fuel oil for naval vessels) and all greenhouse gas emissions from military operations worldwide, including wars. Adding insult to injury, George W. Bush pulled the United States out of the Kyoto Protocol as one of the first acts of his presidency, alleging it would straitjacket the US economy with too costly greenhouse emissions controls. Next, the White House began a neo-Luddite campaign against the science of climate change. In researching “The Green Zone: The Environmental Costs of Militarism,”... getting war casualty statistics out of the Department of Defense (DoD) is easier than getting fuel usage data."

"To the extent that Americans think about these bases at all, we generally assume they’re essential to national security and global peace. Our leaders have claimed as much since most of them were established during World War II and the early days of the Cold War. As a result, we consider the situation normal and accept that US military installations exist in staggering numbers in other countries, on other peoples’ land. On the other hand, the idea that there would be foreign bases on US soil is unthinkable. While there are no freestanding foreign bases permanently located in the United States, there are now around 800 US bases in foreign countries. Seventy years after World War II and 62 years after the Korean War, there are still 174 US “base sites” in Germany, 113 in Japan, and 83 in South Korea, according to the Pentagon. Hundreds more dot the planet in around 80 countries, including Aruba and Australia, Bahrain and Bulgaria, Colombia, Kenya, and Qatar, among many other places. Although few Americans realize it, the United States likely has more bases in foreign lands than any other people, nation, or empire in history."

"In both gulf wars, the U.S. military has performed with incredible skill and discipline, and America has learned that the My Lais of Vietnam were the exception, not the rule."

"It's amazing, when we came together...When we put our differences aside and we declared war on the people that harmed us...When we got together to help the people and the families of the people that died...It made me feel amazing. It made me feel patriotic, it made me feel strong, it made me love this country in a way that in all my years I'd never really loved it. You know? Because that's the America we all dream of. That's the America that we all want, this America that's strong, and powerful and strikes back when necessary. The sleeping giant that we were taught about in our history books, ready to just to just be the super-power that we need to be and having the best army in the world and wow. Wow. A congress and a president that'll work together, and what have we become? Eleven years later? Eleven years later we don't have those answers that we wanted...We have most. We know who did it, we know why they did it. We know how they did it. There's conspiracy theories abound; the proof is pretty much there. But, we've done so much to gut ourselves. We've done so much to gut our freedoms...At the end of the day, the America that we could have been had we stayed on that path, the America that we could have been had we stayed together, had we worked hard to rebuild, to be better to be stronger, is a dream again. You know, and that's really sad...We're more divided than we've ever been, and that? That breaks my heart...You? If you're under the age of eighteen, you've never lived in an America like ours. You know? You've lived in a good country, don't get me wrong. You've lived in a fantastic country, one that's ailing right now, there's no arguing that. But, so close and yet? So far...I remember that American dream, and I just wonder. I wonder if America can ever be the same again. We'll see."

"I am grateful to the men and women of our military for their service, but armies are only expedients, necessary evils. They should be kept out of sight for the same reason I keep the guns out of sight in my home. A military parade does not display greatness—it displays power. And that may be where I most part company with our new nationalists. To my eye, there is more American greatness in a New England town hall than in all of Washington, and more American greatness in an Oregon apple orchard or a Rotary meeting than there is in all the tanks and rockets that ever have been."

"Republicanism did not die away. They remain to temper the scramble for private wealth and happiness and they continue to underlie for many of our ideals and aspirations: for our belief in equality and our dislike of pretension and privilege; our deep yearning for individual autonomy and freedom from all ties of dependency; our periodic hopes, expressed, for example, in the election of military heroes."

"[The Taliban are] committed to the contents of the agreement and hope for good and positive relations with all countries, including the U.S, in the future."

"Realization of the strategic plans for future aggression is connected with the desire to utilize to the utmost the war production facilities of the United States, which had grown to enormous proportions by the end of World War II. American imperialism is persistently pursuing a policy of militarizing the country. Expenditure on the US army and navy exceeds 11,000 million dollars per annum. In 1947-48, 35 per cent of America’s budget was appropriated for the armed forces, or eleven times more than in 1937-1938. On the outbreak of World War II the American army was the seventeenth largest in the capitalist world; today it is the largest one. The United States is not only accumulating stocks of atomic bombs; American strategists say quite openly that it is preparing bacteriological weapons. The strategic plans of the United States envisage the creation in peacetime of numerous bases and vantage grounds situated at great distances from the American continent and designed to be used for aggressive purposes against the USSR and the countries of the new democracy. America has built, or is building, air and naval bases in Alaska, Japan, Italy, South Korea, China, Egypt, Iran, Turkey, Greece, Austria, and Western Germany. There are American military missions in Afghanistan and even in Nepal. Feverish preparations are being made to use the Arctic for purposes of military aggression."

"America's men and women in uniform have given their lives in the fight against Nazism, imperialism, communism, and terrorism. America does not seek conflict or confrontation, but we will never run from it. History is filled with discarded regimes that have foolishly tested America's resolve. Anyone who doubts the strength or determination of the United States should look to our past, and you will doubt it no longer. We will not permit America or our allies to be blackmailed or attacked. We will not allow American cities to be threatened with destruction. We will not be intimidated. And we will not let the worst atrocities in history be repeated here on this ground we fought and died so hard to secure."

"The best way for the United States to prepare for the future is to husband its economic strength and respond militarily only if a serious threat develops. Otherwise, Washington should seek to accommodate, rather than combat."

"I`m a registered Democrat. I tend to vote Democrat. It`s an odd thing to be a Democrat who works with the military, which is overwhelming Republican. I`m comfortable in that; in that milieu because I like to be the skeptic in the room. I like to be the contrarian. And if you`re going to be a contrarian in the military environment, you`re probably going to have to be a Democrat. But that`s the family background I come out of. I had a grandfather who ran as a Progressive."

"Let's make no mistake about this: Congress' choice to keep investing in a massive, ineffective and absurdly expensive war machine has nothing to do with "national security" as most people understand it, or "defense" as the dictionary defines it. U.S. society does face critical threats to our security, including the climate crisis, systemic racism, erosion of voting rights, gun violence, grave inequalities and the corporate hijacking of political power. But one problem we fortunately do not have is the threat of attack or invasion by a rampant global aggressor or, in fact, by any other country at all... If the public is ever to have any impact on this dysfunctional and deadly money-go-round, we must learn to see through the fog of propaganda that masks self-serving corruption behind red, white and blue bunting, and allows the military brass to cynically exploit the public's natural respect for brave young men and women who are ready to risk their lives to defend our country. In the Crimean War, the Russians called British troops "lions led by donkeys." That is an accurate description of today's U.S. military."

"Maintaining a war machine that outspends the 12 or 13 next largest militaries in the world combined actually makes us less safe, as each new administration inherits the delusion that the United States' overwhelmingly destructive military power can, and therefore should, be used to confront any perceived challenge to U.S. interests anywhere in the world — even when there is clearly no military solution and when many of the underlying problems were caused by past misapplications of U.S. military power in the first place. While the international challenges we face in this century require a genuine commitment to international cooperation and diplomacy, Congress allocates only $58 billion, less than 10 percent of the Pentagon budget, to the diplomatic corps of our government: the State Department. Even worse, both Democratic and Republican administrations keep filling top diplomatic posts with officials indoctrinated and steeped in policies of war and coercion, with scant experience and meager skills in the peaceful diplomacy we so desperately need. This only perpetuates a failed foreign policy based on false choices between economic sanctions that UN officials have compared to medieval sieges, coups that destabilize countries and regions for decades, and wars and bombing campaigns that kill millions of people and leave cities in rubble, like Mosul in Iraq and Raqqa in Syria."

"May thy service united ne'er sever, but hold to the colors so true! The Army and Navy forever! Three cheers for the red, white, and blue!"

"You'll go quitely to boot camp They'll shoot you dead, make you a man Don't you worry, it's for a cause Feeding global corporations' claws."

"God bless our troops."

"Let tyrants shake their iron rod, and slavery clank her galling chains. We fear them not, we trust in God...God forever reigns. The foe comes on with haughty stride. Our troops advance with martial noise. Their veterans flee before our youth, and generals yield to beardless boys."

"One of the most important things the United States did in the aftermath of World War II was to help returning veterans."

"America's military superiority remains unrivaled; full stop...The U.S. dominates across land, sea, air and space. America's Middle East misadventures gave the U.S. military a black eye, but the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan speak more to the changing nature of warfare than declining U.S. military superiority. Terrorists and guerrilla fighters give conventional military powers fits by design. The U.S. must ultimately learn to scale down to better meet those challenges. Nevertheless, while conventional military strength might not deter terrorists, it still does a terrific job of deterring hostile nations."

"If your country needs you, you should be right there, that is the way I felt when I was young, and that's the way I feel today."

"[His response to a question about his concerns regarding the “militarization” of foreign policy] We all ought to be concerned. Defense and military leaders are not shy about highlighting the debilitating tendency— across administrations of both parties—to invert the roles of force and diplomacy. We’ve all quoted Secretary of Defense Bob Gates’ line about the military having more musicians than we have Foreign Service officers, and Jim Mattis’ point about needing to “buy more ammunition” if we continue to underinvest in diplomacy. But that hasn’t made much of a dent, I’m afraid. Of course, we ought to ensure that our military is stronger than anyone else’s, that our tool of last resort is potent and durable. And of course, force or the threat of force has an important role to play in the conduct of diplomacy. We’ve all benefited from having the U.S. military focus the minds of those who sat across the table from us... But time and time again, we’ve seen how overreliance on military tools can lead us into policy quicksand. Time and time again, we’ve fallen into the trap of overusing—or prematurely using—force. That comes at much greater cost in American blood and treasure, and tends to make diplomacy a distorted and under-resourced afterthought. In the forever wars of the post-9/11 era, the “great inversion” [of force and diplomacy] also tended to thrust State Department professionals into nation-building roles that are beyond the capacity of American diplomats, or any other external power. While our colleagues served with courage and ingenuity, the fact remains that we’re the American Foreign Service, not the British Colonial Service."

"As Commander in Chief, I can report to you: Our armed forces fought with honor and valor."

"When I called our troops into action, I did so with complete confidence in their courage and skill. And tonight, thanks to them, we are winning the war...The men and women of our armed forces have delivered a message now clear to every enemy of the United States. Even 7,000 miles away, across oceans and continents, on mountaintops and in caves; you will not escape the justice of this nation."

"To all the men and women of the United States Armed Forces...The peace of a troubled world and the hopes of an oppressed people now depend on you. That trust is well placed. The enemies you confront will come to know your skill and bravery. The people you liberate will witness the honorable and decent spirit of the American military. In this conflict, America faces an enemy who has no regard for conventions of war or rules of morality...I know that the families of our military are praying that all those who serve will return safely and soon. Millions of Americans are praying with you for the safety of your loved ones and for the protection of the innocent. For your sacrifice, you have the gratitude and respect of the American people. And you can know that our forces will be coming home as soon as their work is done...The dangers to our country and the world will be overcome. We will pass through this time of peril and carry on the work of peace. We will defend our freedom. We will bring freedom to others and we will prevail...God bless our country and all who defend her."

"America and our allies are fighting a new kind of war against a different kind of enemy. This conflict places great demands on the men and women of our armed forces, including our Guard and Reserve. They've met every test; they've risen to every challenge. The war also places demands on those of us in government. We took an oath to protect our country. We have a solemn responsibility to support the service men and women who defend us in the field of battle."

"Our troops in Iraq have fought bravely. They have done everything we have asked them to do. Where mistakes have been made, the responsibility rests with me."

"From Bunker Hill to Baghdad, the men and women of American Armed Forces have been devoted guardians of our democracy."

"The battles waged by our troops are part of a broader struggle between two dramatically different systems. Under one, a small band of fanatics demands total obedience to an oppressive ideology, condemns women to subservience, and marks unbelievers for murder. The other system is based on the conviction that freedom is the universal gift of Almighty God and that liberty and justice light the path to peace. This is the belief that gave birth to our nation. And in the long run, advancing this belief is the only practical way to protect our citizens."

"I miss being the commander in chief, and that's an easy question to answer. I love our military...I love the military of the United States, and we are a lucky nation to have people who volunteer to serve."

"War is a racket. It always has been. 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. ... This newly acquired territory promptly is exploited by the few -- the selfsame few who wrung dollars out of blood in the war. The general public shoulders the bill. And what is this bill? ... 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."

"I spent thirty-three years and four months in active military service as a member of this country's most agile military force, the Marine Corps. I served in all commissioned ranks from Second Lieutenant to Major-General. And during that period, I spent most of my time being a high class muscle-man for Big Business, for Wall Street and for the Bankers. In short, I was a racketeer, a gangster for capitalism."

"The Armed Services’ own soldiers know that white supremacy in the ranks is a serious problem. A Military Times poll in 2017 found that nearly 25 percent of actively serving military personnel have encountered white nationalism and racism in the Armed Forces. Active duty troops were about 1.3 million at the time, meaning some 325,000 soldiers had encountered white nationalism in some form. Follow up surveys in 2018 and 2019 by the same publication found substantially the same troubling results."

"Replying to Ellison, the Defense Department said that it had received “27 reports of extremist activity (domestic) by Service members over the past five years.” Military officials, the letter continued, had investigated 25 of these reports; ultimately, 18 service members from across the military had been disciplined or forced out of the armed forces. The nature of the extremism of the troops in question was not documented."

"In a statement, a Pentagon spokeswoman, Major Carla Gleason of the Air Force, said: “The DoD uses a multi-level approach to learn as much as possible about potential new soldiers, sailors, airmen and Marines so we can assess whether they should be extended the privilege to serve in the military. While we can't guarantee that every person who enters the service will be free from holding extremist thoughts, various screening tools provide us the best opportunity to identify those who do not share our values.”"

"In the Military Times’ 2018 poll, which included responses from nearly 900 active-duty troops, 22 percent of service members who participated said they had seen signs of white nationalism or racist ideology within the armed forces. Among minority service members polled, incidents of racism and racist ideology increased from 42 percent in 2017 to more than half those surveyed in 2018. Respondents cited casual use of racial slurs and antisemitic language, display of the Confederate flag despite complaints from other troops, swastikas drawn in bathrooms in combat zones, and tattoos known to be connected with white supremacy. It should be noted that were this behavior to occur in a civilian workplace, such incidents would be seen as contributing to a hostile workplace environment. The paper reported that an anonymous service member wrote, “I have several colleagues who have said they are ‘alt-right,’ and that they had made, “very clear statements of strong hatred against blacks, Muslims, Hispanics and immigrants in general. They punish others by withholding favorable assignments, actions, etc.”"