Corporate Takeover of US Military and Foreign Policy |
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by Jim Tarbell
At the turn of the Twentieth Century, corporate lawyers took over the US war and foreign policy apparatus in support of their domestic and international clients. They initiated 125 years of violence and conquest that still plagues our beleaguered planet. The war in Ukraine, the vilification of China, the constant drumbeats of war with Russia that
threaten the future of life as we know, it grew out of Wall Street law firms Root & Stimson, Sullivan & Cromwell, and others.
It all began with the 1896 election, when Wall Street bought the Presidency and sent John D. Rockefeller protégé William McKinley to the White House. He, in turn, appointed Wall Street corporate lawyer Elihu Root to be Secretary of War.
Root, who had been the chief lawyer of the US Sugar Trust, immediately made sure that the prime sugar growing regions of the planet — Puerto Rico, Hawaii, Cuba, and the Philippines — all came under American domination after the Spanish American War. This required denying Puerto Ricans the independence Spain had given Puerto Rico in 1897. Root's Civilian Administrator of Puerto Rico became President of the American Sugar Trust’s lead company in Puerto Rico. The company also came to own 40% of the arable land in Puerto Rico, as part of the biggest sugar refining colossus in the World.
Root also oversaw the formalization of Hawaii as a US territory, appointing Sanford Dole, of the Dole Food family, his first US Territorial Governor. Root also authored the Platt Amendment authorizing US military intervention in Cuba as necessary if they did not acquiesce to being part of the American empire Root was creating.
Most devastatingly, Root oversaw the decade-long US war against the Filipino independence movement. Historian Luzvaminda Francisco estimated that over a million people died in that horrific conflagration. As a result of US occupation, “American companies came to dominate Philippine sugar factories, mills, and refineries.”
Root's greatest imperial legacy for Wall Street was the imposition of the money-as-power Open Door Policy. That policy put the entire planet up for sale and guaranteed US military power would be used to keep that door open. It is still the rationale behind almost all US foreign policy that seeks to maintain corporate access to resources and markets across the globe.
As Secretary of War from 1899 to 1904, and then as Secretary of State from 1905-1909, Root used other Wall Street cronies to launch American corporate conquest of the world. Prominent Wall Street lawyer, William Nelson Cromwell, oversaw the US government’s theft of the Isthmus of Panama from Colombia to build the Panama Canal. Cromwell initially worked to get his French corporate client repaid by US taxpayers for the failed French effort to build the canal. He then helped the Panamanian conspirators acquire money and munitions they needed to promote a revolution that only needed to last long enough to receive recognition by Root's State Department. Once the canal was complete, the American Empire was set to rule the world.
Root’s law partner, Henry Stimson, followed in Root’s footsteps, serving as Secretary of War twice, 1911-13 and 1940-1945. He also served as Secretary of State from 1929-1933. He has been described as the model of the White-Shoe, corporate Wall Street Lawyer, as well as the quintessential member of the Council on Foreign Relations (CFR).
That group, founded by Elihu Root, institutionalized corporate power as the driving force behind US foreign and military policy. For over a century, almost all makers of US foreign and military policy have been connected to CFR. New York bankers historically oversee CFR.
The current Chairman is the Co-Founder and Co-Chair of the nefarious Carlyle Group of investors. Carlyle grew out of a congregation of self-serving Pentagon officials and is now the biggest private equity firm in the world.
At the turn of the Twentieth Century, corporate lawyers took over the US war and foreign policy apparatus in support of their domestic and international clients. They initiated 125 years of violence and conquest that still plagues our beleaguered planet. The war in Ukraine, the vilification of China, the constant drumbeats of war with Russia that
threaten the future of life as we know, it grew out of Wall Street law firms Root & Stimson, Sullivan & Cromwell, and others.
It all began with the 1896 election, when Wall Street bought the Presidency and sent John D. Rockefeller protégé William McKinley to the White House. He, in turn, appointed Wall Street corporate lawyer Elihu Root to be Secretary of War.
Root, who had been the chief lawyer of the US Sugar Trust, immediately made sure that the prime sugar growing regions of the planet — Puerto Rico, Hawaii, Cuba, and the Philippines — all came under American domination after the Spanish American War. This required denying Puerto Ricans the independence Spain had given Puerto Rico in 1897. Root's Civilian Administrator of Puerto Rico became President of the American Sugar Trust’s lead company in Puerto Rico. The company also came to own 40% of the arable land in Puerto Rico, as part of the biggest sugar refining colossus in the World.
Root also oversaw the formalization of Hawaii as a US territory, appointing Sanford Dole, of the Dole Food family, his first US Territorial Governor. Root also authored the Platt Amendment authorizing US military intervention in Cuba as necessary if they did not acquiesce to being part of the American empire Root was creating.
Most devastatingly, Root oversaw the decade-long US war against the Filipino independence movement. Historian Luzvaminda Francisco estimated that over a million people died in that horrific conflagration. As a result of US occupation, “American companies came to dominate Philippine sugar factories, mills, and refineries.”
Root's greatest imperial legacy for Wall Street was the imposition of the money-as-power Open Door Policy. That policy put the entire planet up for sale and guaranteed US military power would be used to keep that door open. It is still the rationale behind almost all US foreign policy that seeks to maintain corporate access to resources and markets across the globe.
As Secretary of War from 1899 to 1904, and then as Secretary of State from 1905-1909, Root used other Wall Street cronies to launch American corporate conquest of the world. Prominent Wall Street lawyer, William Nelson Cromwell, oversaw the US government’s theft of the Isthmus of Panama from Colombia to build the Panama Canal. Cromwell initially worked to get his French corporate client repaid by US taxpayers for the failed French effort to build the canal. He then helped the Panamanian conspirators acquire money and munitions they needed to promote a revolution that only needed to last long enough to receive recognition by Root's State Department. Once the canal was complete, the American Empire was set to rule the world.
Root’s law partner, Henry Stimson, followed in Root’s footsteps, serving as Secretary of War twice, 1911-13 and 1940-1945. He also served as Secretary of State from 1929-1933. He has been described as the model of the White-Shoe, corporate Wall Street Lawyer, as well as the quintessential member of the Council on Foreign Relations (CFR).
That group, founded by Elihu Root, institutionalized corporate power as the driving force behind US foreign and military policy. For over a century, almost all makers of US foreign and military policy have been connected to CFR. New York bankers historically oversee CFR.
The current Chairman is the Co-Founder and Co-Chair of the nefarious Carlyle Group of investors. Carlyle grew out of a congregation of self-serving Pentagon officials and is now the biggest private equity firm in the world.
Neoliberal Military Policy
Derek S. Reveron, professor of National Security affairs at the US Naval War College, outlines how a globalized military has come together to support the objectives of the neoliberal strategy for corporate dominance in his book Exporting Security. Connected by hundreds of bi-lateral and multilateral military agreements, partnerships with almost every nation in the world ensure security for foreign investments, access to natural resources, global trade and economic development. He points out that militaries around the world talk the same language and frame the world in a similar light, making it easy for them to establish life-long relationships of trust. They hold conferences and train military leaders, as well as police and other law enforcement units, in operations from oil platform security to non-lethal crowd control.