This is something few people think about: Most of us in the U.S. have been at war for most of our lives. For younger people, really all of their lives. I was born at the tail end of the Vietnam War but even after we got out of there we were entangled in the money pit of the Cold War. We just managed to get through that and then jumped into the first Gulf War followed by assorted conflicts in places like Somalia and Kosovo. Before long, we had the Big One on September 11th. For the last two decades we have been locked in conflicts in Afghanistan and Iraq, not to mention all over the Middle East, Asia and Africa in quieter conflicts, with no end in sight and no concept of what “victory” would even look like.
As the U.S. prepares to leave Afghanistan, leading to the inevitable Taliban victory returning that shithole to the same state it has always been, many people are asking the big question: Why? Why were we there, what was it all about? A trillion bucks pissed away and all we have to show for it are a bunch of dead and maimed American kids. Why do we keep into these wars for no real reason? Why did a bunch of American die in Mogadishu?
The answer is money. Not from the poppy fields, or at least not primarily. No, the money I am talking about is the endless flow of make-believe money from Uncle Sam buying endless quantities of military hardware and all of the ancillary stuff that goes into a 20 year occupation: food, fuel, housing, vehicles, computers, ammo. All of it lining the pockets of contractors back in the states.
I don’t blame the guys who served, we all thought Our Way Of Life™ was under attack. Turns out Our Way Of Life™ is perverts saying they are transgender so they can get off by wagging their dick around little girls in locker rooms. The guys who signed up after the towers fell thought they were doing the right thing but it seems like many of them realized too late that we were just over there to create a demand for the supplies provided by the Military-Industrial Complex.
Here is one great example from someone who saw inside the belly of the beast from Big Country Expat: Finally Back and Stuff
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| VA HQ in D.C. |
BCE looks at one sliver of the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) and how medical providers are approved. It is kind of inside baseball but you get the gist. The VA is big business, according to government sources the budget is around $315,000,000,000 for fiscal year 2021 with something like 400,000 employees. If there are 331 million people in the U.S. that means that every man, woman and child in America is on the hook for $951 to pay for medical bills for vets in perpetuity. Again, just to be clear, most vets earned this and were promised it so I don’t have an issue with them getting the care they were promised. Whether it is a good idea in general is a topic for another day. What I do have a problem with is that that much money creates a specific incentive.
It is very lucrative to create as many vets as possible who will need VA benefits.
When it comes to making big bucks, it doesn’t really matter to those reaping the profits that creating lots of vets requires creating the conditions needed to justify having a huge military and that means you need lots of wars with scary bad guys and if they are foreigners who look and smell funny, even better. Yes that means a lot of dead and wounded Americans but those quarterly profits aren’t going to make themselves.
Sure, that means that hundreds of thousands of Americans are going to end up dead, missing limbs or with deep psychological trauma but the maimed survivors need even more VA care so that is a win! Even better, they are mostly younger so they have a long life of needing medical care in front of them, creating an annuity stream of medical services that lasts for decades.
Here is the beauty of it. The VA is one of those almost impossible to cut departments. All you have to do is start talking about those who served and keeping our promises and playing a little Lee Greenwood in the background and it is game over. Sort of like “education”, one of the other big grifts in Coruscant. Can’t cut “education” spending, can’t even question it, otherwise you obviously hate the children. Are vets getting the best care possible for the hundreds of billions we spend? No one gives a shit, but are the middle men and hospitals getting filthy rich? That is what really matters.
When it comes to funneling money to connected political donors, there is no sacrifice too great. What is the point of normies raising families if those kids can’t be sent overseas to die on behalf of the military-industrial complex and/or Israel?
I don't know about BCE, but the VA has been very good to me. I wrote about it here https://thatmrgguy.wordpress.com/2012/08/08/i-have-hepatitis-c-thanks-uncle-sam/
Here is the series of posts I wrote about my disease and treatment. https://thatmrgguy.wordpress.com/?s=I+got+hepatitis+c+thanks+&submit=Search
Those VA visits entailed a six hour round trip every time, sometimes a couple times a week. Even my "local" primary VA doctor is a two hour round trip. That's the price of living out in the boonies.
The VA Community Care Act is a boon for veterans like me. I guess I was lucky my latest doctor, a cardiologist, was a preferred doctor. It saved me all those six hour round trips to the VA hospital.
It seems as an outside observer that the care you get is pretty inconsistent from person to person and a lot of that is likely due to the sheer enormity of the organization.
I think regional and area hospital management might have quite a bit to do with the care received.
I've read about the VA hospital horror stories too. Maybe I was just lucky in the hospital and region I was in.
being a vet myself and also worked at a va hospital. It kind of weird, you have some staff that move
mountains for the vets and others who are watching the clock. still the amount of worthless fucks
who are "working" there is unreal. and a few of the "doctors" doing patient care should never be anywhere near one. this should worry anyone who is a vet or caress for one.
and just so you know, the UNION PROTECTS IT'S OWN. forget the vet. too many times a clown who should be tossed on their ass out the door, stays because of the UNION. vet centers in small towns are better than the ones in big cities by far ! and the ones attached to medical schools ,,,,,
that a bit of a crap shoot. either you get lucky or you get some worthless fuck fucking you up.
there a reason vets say the va, giving vets a second chance to die for their country.
one really good thing trump did was making it easier to fire the worthless fucks there.
Sounds like public schools, some really great teachers and a whole bunch of people counting the days until summer break and marking off the years until they can retire.