Foreign Policy & War

Some Warnings for the East: What Former Socialist Countries Need to Know

by Richard M. Ebeling November 1, 1992

For the last three years, the Eastern European countries and the republics of the former Soviet Union have been trying to escape from their socialist past. Democratic governments have been elected, and market reforms have been promised. Yet, in each of these countries, the socialist economic structures still exist ...

The CIA

by Sheldon Richman September 1, 1992

In a 1954 speech to the Conservative Society of Yale Law School, Felix Morley, a founder of the conservative weekly newspaper Human Events, indicted United States foreign policy as "imperial." The U.S. policy, he said, "demands that concentration and centralization of power which has characterized every empire since the days of Nebuchadnezzar." The "enormous ...

Dismantling America’s Military Empire

by Jacob G. Hornberger July 1, 1992

As President Dwight D. Eisenhower warned us thirty years ago, the military-industrial complex is a menace and a threat to the freedom and well-being of the American people. The time has come to dismantle America's military empire. Since the end of World War II, the proponents of conscription, taxation, military spending, and war repeatedly told us, ...

The IMF Doesn’t Deserve a Capital Boost

by Doug Bandow July 1, 1992

For more than four decades, the U.S. has been the largest contributor to not only the IMF but also to all of the other multilateral-aid institutions, such as the World Bank. Indeed, Washington even provides the largest check to the African Development Bank, the Asian Development Bank, the European Bank of Reconstruction and Development, and ...

Nationalism and Classical Liberalism

by Richard M. Ebeling March 1, 1992

For forty-five years, Europe enjoyed peace. But it was in the form of an "armed truce" called the Cold War. On the one side of the Iron Curtain, the Soviet Union maintained its through the threat — and occasional use — of force, as in Hungary in 1956 and Czechoslovakia in 1968. On the other side of the lron ...

The Causes and Consequences of World War II, Part 3

by Richard M. Ebeling January 1, 1992

Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 In 1945, Nazi totalitarianism was destroyed by the military might of the wartime allies. But within a few months of victory, our comrade-in-arms, "Uncle Joe" Stalin (as he was affectionately referred to by President Franklin Roosevelt), was making it clear that the postwar period would not be an era of ...

December 7, 1941: The Infamy of FDR

by Jacob G. Hornberger December 1, 1991

The Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor, Hawaii — December 7, 1941 — killed or injured over 4,500 Americans. It destroyed most of America's Pacific fleet. Almost 200 American aircraft were lost. Although America's defenders at Pearl Harbor fought bravely and courageously, the attack resulted in a massacre. There is no better example of the political indoctrination which the American people ...

The Causes and Consequences of World War II, Part 2

by Richard M. Ebeling December 1, 1991

Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 World War II was not a war between freedom and tyranny. Rather it was a conflict between alternative systems of collectivism. By the 1930s, there was not one major country devoted to and practicing the principles of classical liberalism — the political philosophy of individual liberty, free-market capitalism and free ...

Pearl Harbor: The Controversy Continues

by Sheldon Richman December 1, 1991

At 7:53 am. on Sunday, December 7, 1941, a Japanese force of 183 fighters, bombers, and torpedo planes struck the United States Pacific fleet at Pearl Harbor, Hawaii. Some 4,500 Americans were killed or wounded. As news of the surprise attack spread, William F. Friedman, an Army cryptanalyst who had helped to break the Japanese ...

The Much-Coveted World War II

by Jacob G. Hornberger November 1, 1991

From the first grade in their government-approved schools, Americans are taught never to question the consequences of America's participation in World War II. "We defeated Hitler. Freedom prevailed over tyranny," we are taught "and there is nothing further to consider or discuss." The political indoctrination is so complete that the minds of many Americans will forever remain closed to ...

The Causes and Consequences of World War II, Part 1

by Richard M. Ebeling November 1, 1991

Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 When World War II ended in 1945, most of Europe lay in ruins. German cities like Dresden and Hamburg had practically been cremated from day-and-night Allied fire-bombings. Warsaw had been almost leveled to the ground by the Germans. The scorched-earth policies of both the Nazis and the Soviets had left ...

The Consequences of World War II

by Sheldon Richman November 1, 1991

World War II is often viewed as the last good war. In contrast to the wars that followed it — Korea and Vietnam, primarily World War II is said to have had a clear purpose: the smashing of Nazism and fascism and all the horrible things for which they stood. The description "last good war" also implies that the ...