The use of Private Military Firms grew rapidly following the end of the Cold War. As an extension of the traditional Military-Industrial Complex, these firms are a danger to US democracy because their proliferation deepens militarism in the US, rewards interests that benefit from the conduct of war, and leads to expansion of conflict largely absent from public consent.
There is a long history of civilians performing paid services for the United States government in times of conflict. However, since the end of the Cold War this trend has significantly increased; from 10 percent of total forces during the 1991 Gulf War to almost 50 percent following the 2003 invasion of Iraq. In the US, this increase is a result of the use of Private Military Firms (PMF) which has brought neoliberal ideology into the realm of security assistance by creating private solutions to roles previously fulfilled publicly. This trend multiplies private defense contracts and deepens the traditional ‘military-industrial complex’ (MIC)—a term popularized by President Eisenhower to describe the influence of the defense industry upon democratic governance. However, PMFs must be understood as not only an outgrowth of the MIC, but also as a tool furthering political interests beyond this complex. This is a threat to US democracy because privatizing security roles takes an additional step in insulating the use of force from the majority vote while also providing significant monetary incentives to a fraction of the population which can capitalize upon, and perpetuate, these private firms and their profitable conflicts. This essay, therefore, argues that as a neoliberal product of the traditional MIC, PMFs comprise a threat to democratic government not only because their economic incentives tend to steer the national interest towards preparing for and waging war but also because of the degree to which politicians can expand the conflict absent public observation.
Identifying how the political-economic planning of the national economy was centralized, thereby creating the MIC, is first required in order to highlight the point at which PMFs transcend this boundary. The contemporary defense economy originates in the central planning era of WWII. Business historian Alfred Chandler explains that during WWII the… “[US] government spent far more than the most enthusiastic New Dealer had ever proposed,” with the output expended while supplying massive armed forces the US entered… “a period of prosperity,” never before seen. The effort required… “a tight, centralized control of the national economy…to carry out one of the most complex pieces of economic planning in history.” Following WWII, the intricate relationship, its success in ending the Great Depression and its future applicability became well understood by policy-makers.
Head of the War Production Board during WWII, Charles Wilson argued that the answer to economic instability in a post-WWII world may require establishing what he called a ‘permanent war economy’. The post-WWII plan for creating this type of political economy was outlined in National Security Council Report 68 (NSC 68), for which massive increases in defense spending were called. The foundations that this spending would build upon had been established by the National Defense Research Council (NDRC) in 1941. The NDRC consisted of a web of US research universities (e.g. MIT, Caltech) and defense industries (e.g. General Electric, AT&T) working together. This created a network for the development of military innovations during the war and, after NSC 68, major increases in funding for innovations in the post-WWII era. Explicit in these relationships was an understanding that innovative technology would be diffused to private corporations. Private profit would therefore be created both from diffused technology, which would create new and more competitive corporations, as well as from direct government purchases of military products. While the overall affect of this relationship has been determinative in shaping the post-WWII US economy, its general pervasiveness makes distinct separations between MIC-connected and unconnected corporate development difficult to conclude. According to economist Aguiar De Medeiros… “it is not easy to evaluate the weight and the influence of military basic innovation in all basic innovations that shaped the American economy in the post-war era…the ‘military-academic-industrial complex’ set up all new science-based industries,” and set the lead in many others. A 2003 CNNMoney article explained this continuing case when it stated that… “[t]he next time American armed forces go to war…the nature of the battle will be unlike anything the world has ever known…and it’s made possible…[by a] new high-tech arsenal…[that] has also created a new military-industrial complex…the innovation that underpins high-tech warfare comes increasingly from companies that aren’t widely known for defense work”. Therefore, the incentive towards increased military spending is twofold. In the one instance, research and development necessary for a competitive economy is closely linked to defense spending while in the other, the use of these products creates lucrative markets for investment—but only if demand is kept high by expended product.
A lovely article -- a little wordy, but nice and thorough. It would be nice to see some citations, especially in your final paragraph where you boldy imply that the supremacy of popular policy over the elite is proved through genuine research, contrary to the beliefs of mainstream IR scholars. Unpack that a little more, and you've sold me.
