Libertarian Party of Massachusetts: Peace Now — Eisenhower was Right

The Libertarian Party of Massachusetts is running Facebook Page campaigns to promote the Libertarian viewpoint. This post is from Peace Now – End the Warfare State.

Peace Now — Eisenhower was Right

Dwight David Eisenhower rose from West Point to our highest military rank, General of the Army. He commanded the largest military force America has ever put into the field. In 1953, he became President. He left us with much sound advice, advice that we ignore to our peril.

In his 1953 speech, The Chance for Speech, Eisenhower said: “…The way chosen by the United States was plainly marked by a few clear precepts, which govern its conduct in world affairs… Any nation’s right to form of government and an economic system of its own choosing is inalienable. Any nation’s attempt to dictate to other nations their form of government is indefensible….”
Libertarians say: We now do just the opposite. Under Bush and Obama, we bomb and invade around the world, trying to impose our choices of government. The Bush/Obama policy is totally wrong. It rejects everything that made our country good and great. We call for non-intervention.

In 1961, Eisenhower advised..”A vital element in keeping the peace is our military establishment. Our arms must be mighty, ready for instant action, so that no potential aggressor may be tempted to risk his own destruction…This conjunction of an immense military establishment and a large arms industry is new in the American experience…In the councils of government, we must guard against the acquisition of unwarranted influence, whether sought or unsought, by the military industrial complex….We must never let the weight of this combination endanger our liberties or democratic processes….”

The Libertarian Party says: The Soviet threat Eisenhower wisely feared is gone. The combination he warned against, the military industrial complex and the surveillance state, is the chief threat to our freedoms. We must end them`.
Of military expenditures, Eisenhower said in 1953:

“.. Every gun that is made, every warship launched, every rocket fired signifies, in the final sense, a theft from those who hunger and are not fed, those who are cold and are not clothed. This world in arms is not spending money alone. It is spending the sweat of its laborers, the genius of its scientists, the hopes of its children. . . This is not a way of life at all, in any true sense. Under the cloud of threatening war, it is humanity hanging from a cross of iron…”

The Soviet threat is gone. The Libertarian Party calls for honoring Eisenhower’s words. We need massive cuts in defense spending, and massive reductions in the size of our military. There is no better way to build a stronger America.
Democrats and Republicans point at the Islamic State. They want a war.

Libertarians say: The Islamic State has no air force, no navy, next to no tanks or artillery. It has no path to invading America. Democrats and Republicans offer us the counsels of fear and cowardice. This time, FDR had it right. We have nothing to fear but fear itself. We should reject the Republicans and Democrats and their counsels of cowardice.