Survival__ Structuring Prosperity for Yourself and the Nation - Charles George Smith [25]
It is important to preface any discussion of Empire by noting that those serving their nation honorably in the U.S. Armed Forces are not always well served by their civilian leadership. The reason citizens serve is to defend the nation, which is the Constitutionally mandated, legitimate purpose of the Armed Forces.
Yet we must not blind ourselves to the reality that the military can also be deployed to serve illegitimate purposes which are presented ("sold") as legitimate to the American public and service members. The citizens who take the oath of service are sworn to uphold the Constitution and to obey their civilian leadership's orders. If the civilian leadership is pursuing agendas other than true national defense--for instance, a commercial and diplomatic Empire--then the U.S. military can be ordered to pursue missions which have little or nothing to do with national defense and everything to do with protecting and extending the interests of the Power Elites which dominate the civilian leadership of the nation.
Those who serve in the U.S. Armed Forces at mid-rank levels of responsibility are aware of the U.S. military's global reach. The average citizen might not know that the U.S. maintains bases in 63 countries and has personnel stationed in approximately 150 nations.
The entire world has been divided into six military zones (Africa was recently set up with its own command), with separate U.S. commands which each control extensive communications, intelligence, war-gaming and planning resources.
"These facilities include a total of 845,441 different buildings and equipments. The underlying land surface is of the order of 30 million acres. According to Gelman, who examined 2005 official Pentagon data, the US is thought to own a total of 737 bases in foreign lands. Adding to the bases inside U.S. territory, the total land area occupied by US military bases domestically within the US and internationally is of the order of 2,202,735 hectares, which makes the Pentagon one of the largest landowners worldwide (Gelman, J., 2007)."
Approximately 369,000 active duty personnel out of a total of 1.4 million serve overseas. Many U.S. military postings are small (a few hundred personnel) and are not combat missions but peacekeeping, medical/logistics, intelligence, support of alliances such as NATO, etc.
The U.S. also maintains Reserve forces (National Guard, etc.) of which about 145,000 are on active duty, and employs an unknown but substantial number of civilian employees (contractors) overseas as well.
Though the Intelligence Community (CIA, NSA, NRO-National Reconnaissance Office, etc.) and the Pentagon (Defense Intelligence Agency, Naval Intelligence, etc.) have some overlapping functions and hence some rivalries, in the larger context the Armed Forces and the Intelligence Community should be viewed as pieces of a truly global Empire which is under the control of the civilian government of the U.S.
No other nation or even alliance has an equivalent global reach. In effect, every nation in the world is a "point of interest," as the U.S. has interests-- commercial, diplomatic and "soft power"--in every nation larger than a small city.
If the U.S. influence were limited to a global military system, it would not be much of an Empire. But the Pentagon and Intelligence forces are merely one branch of a much larger structure which includes a vast diplomatic network--equally as impressive as the military reach--and pervasive commercial interests, of which Coca-Cola, McDonalds and Kentucky Fried Chicken are simply the most visible.
Many American commercial interests are hidden from view behind limited partnerships, wholly owned local corporations, joint ventures and the like; financial and banking interests are similarly cloaked. There is also some overlap of military and corporate interests, as U.S. weapons systems are sold to foreign