THE U.S. MILITARY AND THE AMERICAN RIGHT: A PRESUMED ALLIANCE?
In modern memory, the American Right has regarded our military as something of its own. More conservatives than liberals usually joined because the grit of war and arms (not to mention the personal risk) are inimical to liberal ideas; and the Left, not the Right, was burning draft cards and spitting on young Americans in uniform.
Appreciation for the virtues of valor, patriotism, and the masculine culture of arms is widely found on the Right, and the 1960s antagonism of the Left towards the armed forces sealed the deal. A commensurate “benefit of the doubt” to the armed forces from the conservative Main Street has been common and expected.
Most political leaders considered military service as a desirable – if not essential – qualification. The mainstream Left was muted in their military support when they demonstrated it, but on Memorial Day, they would still lay wreaths and sing the national anthem alongside others.
But the changing culture of our country, and the sinister behavior of our leaders and government, must force an objective reassessment of the American profession of Arms.
Most Americans who joined the military from the Revolution through World War II did so with an already ingrained patriotic ethos. It was not instilled in them once they joined the service.
The Colonists fought for the independence of their homes, towns, and neighbors; not for DEI or in foreign wars.
Civilian Minutemen and hard-bitten volunteers laid the imperious British Army low, even being referenced in song, “They fought so unfairly from the back of the trees, if they’d only fought open we’d have beat them with ease.”
Even the professional reform of the U.S. military following the Revolution was built on the ethos of the citizen-soldier who had fought and died with the love of country, hearth, and home brought with them to the battlefields, ready to stop an existential threat to their way of life.
Imperial armies were the instruments of Alexander, the Roman emperors, and their ideological descendants in the Europe most Colonists fled. Such armies were not in the Founders’ design.
Those who signed the Declaration of Independence were suspicious of the evil a standing army could wreak when it conquered for an imperator’s pleasure, and the Second Amendment was an outgrowth of that suspicion.
An army, when it had to exist, was a necessary evil.
The modern U.S. military has come a long way from Valley Forge and is a cross-section of people who are only partly politically or socially conservative, and who have been socialized in our increasingly liberal culture.
Many join and remain for personal reasons aside from the good of the nation. Support for “your country” is highly nuanced depending on your vision of it, and the population no longer arrives at boot camp with the common vision of American unity and social values that the previous generations possessed.
With typical American economic pragmatism, the armed forces have long been enticing people into enlistments with assorted benefits that will be useful after their service term. This must force an examination of why people are really signing up.
Current senior American military leaders have more of a corporate mentality than a warrior mentality.
This has been noticed at the highest levels with generals and admirals displaying an affinity for leftist rhetoric and social causes, and in how the lower ranks are treated and trained.
Since it is front and center to all armies, let us now dive into the core of the military ethos.
Militarism is not “right wing,” not even in American trappings. We should remember that three of the most evil societies on Earth were some of the most militarized.
They were highly successful, both operationally and practically, in that regard, these being Nazi Germany, Communist China (still), and the Soviet Union, with the modern Russian state continuing the tradition.
You will not find a communist or socialist state that does not value regimentation or force.
Although the American Left once styled itself as anti-violence, that mask was never firmly worn and is now gone.
The Left hated the U.S. military because it didn’t control it. The burning of draft cards and cries of “baby killers” during Vietnam were propaganda coordinated with the Soviet KGB.
Modern Middle Eastern terrorism traces its roots back to SS commando Otto Skorzeny and his Werewolf project as he advised militants such as Yassir Arafat, Moammar Kaddafi, and President Gamel Nasser of Egypt after World War II.
Socialists invented the assault rifle and Communists perfected it, with the AK-47 being the mass-produced “people’s rifle” to overthrow capitalist governments from the hills and fields with asymmetric firepower.
Shock troops, organized aerial bombing, and modern mechanized warfare were other examples of military instruments initially grown and perfected in the socialist and imperial dark heart of Europe.
Our military would never be labeled a “right-wing” entity with its camouflage, tanks, and other martial trappings gone.
It has many features that statists find useful: Insularity versus “the other,” A social model of the individual made insignificant for the sake of the whole, Uniformity, and Mandated coercive obedience – backed by sanctions that would be unconstitutional if applied to the whole of society.
However necessary these traits may be in a military organization, they do not lie comfortably alongside the American way of thinking or the American way of life.
The documented instances – in fact, expectation – of abuse of power in the ranks from human nature provides additional evidence of this. It is not humorous outside of cartoons.
The Left has found the military’s culture of following orders under pain of the UCMJ an irresistible push-button.
Our troops have been repeatedly used by “social reformers” for experiments in gender, race relations, and other liberal social goals. Mandated COVID vaccines were the most recent example.
While it has been steadily altering the U.S. military culture, the Left has also co-opted the language of patriotism to regularly decry as “insurrectionists,” “traitors,” “un-American,” and “deplorable” citizens on the Right.
This would have been bad enough just in the professional culture of the university campuses. But our military is socialized to commit violence against those the government targets, and the possibility for the military to become a coercive instrument of left wing change for the country is also clear.
The best and wisest choice historically was to keep the military as a neutral instrument of violence answerable to all the people; and that imperative is being ignored.
Defending the country is always the first mission of the military, and we find a significant anomaly there, as well. Analysis of our military activity in the last century up to the present shows that the vast amount was not done directly for the defense of hearth and home, but was overseas.
With adequate policies and a powerful Navy, the two large oceans around our continent would have stymied any invasion of our hemisphere.
World War I had very little to do with America – at first – and was broadly an example of how foreign entanglements and alliances can bring nations to grief.
It has been discussed on To The Point how the United States was leveraged into World War II through machinations for the sake of the Soviets. (Please read George Washington’s recorded wisdom at that link also.)
Both the Korean and Vietnam Wars were fought to stop the alleged “Domino Effect” of Communism in faraway Asia.
If the recent multi-billion-dollar intervention in the Middle East was for the defense of the United States, it failed.
Arguments over the political and operational factors of the above conflicts can be made along with cases for our participation being justifiable. But ironically, a genuine invasion of the United States at the southern border has been ongoing and unopposed by the government while the U.S. military focuses on global concerns dictated by the WEF, the CFR, or likely Barack Obama.
We have not seen a military effort launched or considered that could end the border crisis that is making many U.S. cities a playground for Snake Plissken. Our border security is theatrical.
As we watch, we have the possibility of the Ukraine War widening. We have a pending showdown with China over Taiwan. The Middle East fighting is escalating and has already drawn in multiple countries.
Iran has determined to wipe Israel from the map and a war between them is currently certain. The post-October 7th Israel, particularly under Benjamin Netanyahu, will do to them what Rome did to Carthage before that happens. And Iran’s leaders will happily spill their people’s blood against Israel just as they do every day on their streets.
This world is now a powder keg without even discussing U.S. internal strife.
Large wars affect the very fabric of life, such as during World War II. Industry was regulated and re-tooled for the war effort. Everything from food to vehicles was rationed or unavailable. An entire nation fell into line and did as told.
However necessary this may have been or was, it is hard to imagine a state of the Union more inherently attractive to the Left. Consider the likely availability of guns and munitions – or anything Second Amendment- or preparedness-related – for the private citizen during a future major war.
We cannot do without our military. Current world conditions and the lessons of history demand that we have one, and that it be adequately prepared for our defense.
But if a “powder keg” blows up while the nation is being led by the Left, what will the implications be for us? Would a war benefit the Left, as it would retool American life to meet the demand?
How many additional government programs, mandates, rations, and restrictions on daily life would come? What would the war goals be, and when would they end?
Who might be drafted, and what would be the ethos they would find in the ranks of the military? Could another American war be the final undoing of our America?
Or might the next “war” be one in which the Left, possessing a suitably indoctrinated military, wages war inside the United States against a segment of the people? We should draw a lesson from how the Left has so successfully infiltrated American law enforcement.
Like a loaded firearm, we must understand and respect our military when handling it, and be wary of it falling into the wrong hands.
Mark Deuce has had a life-long career in community law enforcement. He is the author of Deuces Wild for TTP.