Folkstyre! blindstyre

Governments don’t work in the interests of the people
March 30, 2009

Between now and 2011, the UK government will spend over £130bn on its military. Of course, the MOD likes to define this as “defence” spending, yet anyone with common sense, albeit uncommon, is able to see that this not defence spending, since the UK has not had to defend itself since 1945; rather it has attacked defenceless third world countries from Kosovo to Afghanistan, so the more accurate term would be “attack” spending. The only premise under which “defence” spending is viable is when it is applied as being spending in defence of elite interests- foreign oil fields, access to gas pipelines, and preservations of an imperial order in which the UK serves as the US’s loyal spear thrower. In this context, the epithet is entirely accurate, and it serves to illustrate the point of the title: in the same way that government defence spending is spending in defence not of the country, but of powerful interests, governments do not act in the interests of their country, but in those of powerful elites.