You sound as if there was some sort of a cabal of key capitalists meeting in secrecy to devise new ways to keep the system going. That capitalists conspire to boost their profits is not news - that is the essence of such common phenomena like "strategic planning" or "lobbying." But that is much different than saying that capitalist machinations are responsible for most, if not all, ills of modern world from wars to suburban sprawl to AIDS epidemics. That is what I call the "telescopic view of history and society" - a telescope "flattens" the perceive distance between the observed objects, making them appear to be on the same plane. Similarly, a telescopic view of history and society "flattens" complex social - economic - political relations by attributing them to a single, most salient "cause" - e.g. "communism" " capitalism" "free market" "islam" "race" "imperialism" "personality cult" and so on.
If capitalism were the single or main cause of war, greed, or conspicuous consumption, it would hold to reason that without capitalism there would be no wars, greed, or conspicuous consumption - which is demonstrably false. A more tenable position is that macro-social institutions (such as property relations, organization of the economy, etc.) are a part of the structuration process (Anthony Gidden's term) - which means that they are constrained by- take advantage of- and shape their social-political-economic environment.
That is to say, wars, greed and propensity toward conspicuous consumption are a part of the human condition. For example, there is a compelling argument in historical anthropology that overconsumption did the prehistoric native Americans in (they exterminated through excessive hunting most of the large mammals on the American continent). Slavery was practiced by Arabs and Africans long before it was established in "capitalist" America. Capitalists did not invent or created these phenomena - they merely adopted them to their own benefits.
That, BTW, applies to most human creations. Humans are not as creative as some philosophical idealists want us to believe. They do not create things ex nihilo. Most creators are in fact clever imitators - they take what's around them, selectively cobble it together, add a new twist here and there and they present it to the crowds as "their" creation. A smart thing to "deconstruct" that is to analyze it, that is, attribute it back to the environment.
wojtek