> As Graeber notes in his book, the link between finance and state military
> is > primordial.
>
> Joanna
Well, it was certainly news to me. I think it must be news to a lot of other people. NYPD didn't have such a formal arrangement until 1998 according to the article.
This isn't really the same as a crooked police commission or mayor on the take. That was the old way to get the same thing, and probably cheaper. It used to be considered a crime to bribe a cop.
And then, the US military are supposed to be separate from US domestic police departments who are supposed to be under local authority. I know the military and domestic police have been de facto merging for decades, via an early discharge release policy in the services, and the extra points you get if you are ex-military and apply to a police department.
This was military policy in yore, but not available to draftees.
The other aspect to this general idea is in the military itself. During Vietnam, combat was supposed to mean, go out and kill the armed enemy, but it morphed into search and destroy missions, which turned into something like drug raids, that is police work. Go kick down a door and toss the place, round up the suspects and either kill them outright or haul them off to the ARVN to `take care of'...which meant torture and jail or killed. Pure Nazis stuff. It's this policy that gave meaning to the iconic photo:
http://graphics8.nytimes.com/images/2004/09/19/obituaries/eddie_vietnam.jpg
These are the kinds of actions that nearly destroyed the US Army, a lesson the current Pentagon seems to have forgotten. I mean there is a reason for such a high rate of mental disorders, PTSD in Iraq and Afghanistan, etc. It destroys the soul to beat up, maime, and kill people who are trying to get by and want nothing to do with you.
As the Israeli and Egyptian military must have realized in their rotten military mind, if your army gets used to shooting unarmed civilians, you are not prepared for an armed military engagement. You are also not prepared to mow down thousands who have nothing more than rocks and their bodies.
Even so, I take your point.
CG
