by Hall Gardner
50. Catherine A. Theohary, Conventional Arms Transfers to Developing Nations, 2008-2015 (Washington, DC: Congressional Research Service, December 19, 2016), https://fas.org/sgp/crs/weapons/R44716.pdf (accessed October 24, 2017).
51. Melvin A. Goodman, National Insecurity: The Cost of American Militarism (San Francisco: City Lights, 2013).
52. Mike De Bonis, “The Pentagon Found $125 Billion in Waste. Now a GOP Chairman is Asking Other Agencies What They've Found,” Washington Post, February 10, 2017, https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/powerpost/wp/2017/02/10/the-pentagon-found-125-billion-in-waste-now-a-gop-chairman-is-asking-other-agencies-what-theyve-found/?utm_term=.819a68f3904b (accessed October 24, 2017).
53. John M. Donnelly, “Atomic Arsenal Costs Ballooning by Billions of Dollars,” Roll Call, January 9, 2017, http://www.rollcall.com/news/policy/atomic-arsenal-costs-ballooning-billions-dollars (accessed October 24, 2017).
54. Geoff Ziezulewicz, “B61-12 Life Extension Program Receives NNSA Approval,” UPI, August 2, 2016, http://www.upi.com/Business_News/Security-Industry/2016/08/02/B61-12-life-extension-program-receives-NNSA-approval/3261470147434/ (accessed October 24, 2017).
55. Will Saetren, “3 Nuclear Weapons Programs Obama Should Kill,” National Interest, September 11, 2016, http://nationalinterest.org/feature/3-nuclear-weapons-programs-president-obama-should-kill-17654 (accessed October 24, 2017).
56. Amanda Macias, “The Legacy of the 2011 Debt Ceiling Fight Is the Biggest Issue the Next President Will Face on Day One,” Business Insider, August 14, 2016, http://www.businessinsider.com/budget-control-act-2016-8?r=UK&IR=T/#what-is-the-budget-control-act-1 (accessed October 24, 2017).
57. See William Hartung, Prophets of War: Lockheed Martin and the Making of the Military Industrial Complex (New York: Nation Books, 2012).
58. Andrea Shalal-Esa, “Exclusive: US Sees Lifetime Cost of F-35 Fighter at $1.45 Trillion,” Reuters, March 29, 2012, http://www.reuters.com/article/us-lockheed-fighter-idUSBRE82S03L20120329 (accessed October 24, 2017).
59. F-35 Strike Fighter: DOD Needs to Complete Developmental Testing before Making Significant New Investments (Washington, DC: US Government Accountability Office, April 2017), http://www.gao.gov/assets/690/684208.pdf (accessed October 24, 2017); “DoD Releases Fiscal Year 2018 Budget Proposal.”
60. Dave Majumdar, “America's F-35 Stealth Fighter vs. Russia's Su-35: Who Wins?” National Interest, September 15, 2015, http://nationalinterest.org/blog/the-buzz/americas-f-35-stealth-fighter-vs-russias-su-35-who-wins-13855 (accessed October 24, 2017); Rakesh Krishnan Simha “Stealth Troubles: Why Leading Air Forces Want More Traditional Warplanes,” Russia Beyond, January 23, 2017, https://in.rbth.com/blogs/stranger_than_fiction/2017/01/23/stealth-troubles-why-leading-air-forces-want-more-traditional-warplanes_686613 (accessed October 25, 2017).
61. During the Reagan years, the gap between the expanding economy and the shrinking investment in public works/capital meant that the growing private economy augmented demands for public services that could not be supplied by a public sector that was decreasing in size. Hossein-zadeh, Political Economy. Here, however, Trump hopes to replace publicly supplied services and infrastructure with private financing.
62. Alex Ward, “What America's New Arms Deal with Saudi Arabia Says about the Trump Administration,” Vox, May 20, 2017, https://www.vox.com/2017/5/20/15626638/trump-saudi-arabia-arms-deal (accessed October 25, 2017).
63. Lingling Wei, “Push by China's Sovereign-Wealth Fund,” Wall Street Journal, May 17, 2017, https://www.wsj.com/articles/trump-trade-reboot-spurs-u-s-push-by-chinas-sovereign-wealth-fund-1495022339 (accessed October 25, 2017); Viola Zhou, “China's Sovereign Wealth Fund Wants to Invest in the US Infrastructure Rebuild, Chairman Says,” South China Morning Post, January 16, 2017, http://www.scmp.com/business/companies/article/2062593/chinas-sovereign-wealth-fund-wants-invest-us-infrastructure (accessed October 25, 2017).
64. Jaclyn Reiss, “Bernie Sanders Rails against Trump after Speech,” Boston Globe, March 1, 2017, http://www.bostonglobe.com/news/politics/2017/03/01/bernie-sanders-rails-against-trump-after-speech/zFBd9Ff88rSdszRVrdlCJL/story.html?p1=Article_Trending_Most_Viewed (accessed May 26, 2017). According to critics such as Bernie Sanders, Trump also wants to give tax breaks worth as much as $3 trillion to the very rich.
65. This was the case of arms firms who pushed NATO enlargement as a means to expand arms sales in the late 1990s. Katherine Q. Seelye, “Arms Contractors Spend to Promote an Expanded NATO,” New York Times, March 30, 1998, http://www.nytimes.com/1998/03/30/world/arms-contractors-spend-to-promote-an-expanded-nato.html?pagewanted=all&_r=0US (accessed October 25, 2017).
66. Mike Pence has called for reviving two wasteful weapons programs: the Army's Future Combat Systems and the Air Force's F-22 Raptor fighter jet, which was dumped by the Obama administration. Then Defense Secretary Robert Gates's decision to scrap the F-22 was in part the result of major cost overruns. Austin Wright, “Pence Could Undermine Key Trump War Argument,” Politico, July 14, 2016, http://www.politico.com/story/2016/07/mike-pence-donald-trump-war-argument-225565 (accessed October 25, 2017); Jeremiah Gertler, Air Force F-22 Fighter Program (Washington, DC: Congressional Research Service, July 11, 2013), https://www.fas.org/sgp/crs/weapons/RL31673.pdf (accessed October 25, 2017).
67. Staff, “Trump's Remarks on Military Readiness,” Washington Examiner, September 7, 2016, http://www.washingtonexaminer.com/text-trumps-remarks-on-military-readiness/article/2601173 (accessed October 25, 2017).
68. McCain's plan would add $430 billion more than FY2017 projections, thus bringing the defense budget to $800 billion in fiscal 2022. McGarry, “Trump Unveils Plan.”
69. Daniel Bukszpan, “Why Bernie Sanders Is Backing a $1.5 Trillion Military Boondoggle,” CNBC, July 12, 2016, http://www.cnbc.com/2016/07/12/why-bernie-sanders-is-backing-a-15-trillion-military-boondoggle.html (accessed May 26, 2017). Other boondoggles include the excessive expense of the USS Enterprise and USS Zumwald.
CHAPTER 3: THE NEW BOGEYMAN
1. Ruth Marcus, “Count on Trump to Be a Sore Loser,” Washington Post, August 5, 2016, https://www.pressreader.com/usa/the-washington-post/20160805/282050506447036 (accessed May 29, 2017).
2. These agencies included the CIA, the National Security Agency, the Justice Department, the Treasury Department's Financial Crimes Enforcement Network, and representatives of the director of national intelligence. Former CIA Director John Brennan testified that he had warned Alexander Bortnikov, head of the FSB Russian intelligence service, against tampering with the US elections in August 2016. Bortnikov, however, denied that Russia was meddling, but said he would raise the issue with President Vladimir Putin. Brennan could not describe Russian-Trump team interactions as “collusion.” Tom LoBianco, “Ex-CIA Chief John Brennan: Russians Contacted Trump Campaign,” CNN, May 23, 2017, http://edition.cnn.com/2017/05/23/politics/john-brennan-house-intelligence-committee/ (accessed October 25, 2017).
3. Evelyn Rupert, “Senate Intel Panel to Probe Trump Team's Ties to Russia,” Hill, January 13, 2017, http://thehill.com/policy/cybersecurity/314298-senate-intel-committee-to-probe-russian-interference-in-election (accessed October 25, 2017).
4. Donald Trump (@realDonaldTrump): “Senators should focus their energies on ISIS, illegal immigration and border security instead of always looking to start World War III,” Twitter, January 29, 2017, 1:49 p.m., https://twitter.com/realdonaldtrump/status/825823217025691648?lang=en (accessed October 25, 2017).
5. Richard Gonzales, “Senate Panel Plans to Investigate Russian Activities during US Elections,” NPR, January 13, 2017, http://www.npr.org/sections/the-two-way/2017/01/13/509762116/senate-panel-plans-to-investigate-russian-activities-during-u-s-elections (accessed October 25, 2017).
6. Ellen Nakashima, “Russia's Apparent Meddling in US Election Is Not an Act of War, Cyber Expert Says,” Washington Post, February 7, 2017, https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/checkpoint/wp/2017/02/07/russias-apparent-meddling-in-u-s-election-is-not-an-ac
t-of-war-cyber-expertsays/?postshare=1741486560691485&tid=ss_mail&utm_term=.ed8edfa98213 (accessed May 29, 2017).
7. Zack Beauchamp and Andrew Prokop, “Robert Mueller's Russia Investigation, and Why Trump Is so Afraid of It,” Vox News, August 3, 2017, https://www.vox.com/world/2017/7/24/16008272/robert-mueller-fbi-trump-russia-explained (accessed November 5, 2017).
8. David Voreacos, Stephanie Baker, and Shannon Pettypiece, “Three Trump Associates Charged in Russia Collusion Probe,” Bloomberg News, October 30, 2017, https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2017-10-30/trump-s-ex-campaign-chairman-manafort-told-to-surrender-to-u-s (accessed November 5, 2017).
9. “Statement by President Donald J. Trump on the Signing of H.R. 3364,” news release, White House, Office of the Press Secretary, August 2, 2017, https://www.whitehouse.gov/the-press-office/2017/08/02/statement-president-donald-j-trump-signing-hr-3364 (accessed October 25, 2017).
10. Steve Mollman, “What Would Actually Happen If Donald Trump Shot That Russian Ship ‘Right out of the Water,’” Quartz, February 17, 2017, https://qz.com/913443/what-would-actually-happen-if-trump-shot-that-russian-ship-right-out-of-the-water/ (accessed October 25, 2017).
11. Darlene Superville, “Trump Defends Seeking Better Ties with Russia,” Intelligencer, February 6, 2017, http://www.theintelligencer.net/news/top-headlines/2017/02/trump-u-s-isnt-so-innocent/ (accessed October 25, 2017).
12. Ibid. This answer (which is not very presidential, but crudely honest) enraged a number of political elites, as if they had forgotten CIA/KGB assassinations during the Cold War and after. The grim reality is that the US foreign policy elites must deal with many leaders that are “killers,” whether Washington likes it or not, and whether those countries like dealing with the United States.
13. Numerous critics of Putin have died in mysterious circumstances, but it is not clear who paid for the killings. Mary Louise Kelly, “The Curious Deaths of Kremlin Critics,” NPR, August 30, 2016, http://www.npr.org/sections/parallels/2016/08/30/491898040/the-curious-deaths-of-kremlin-critics (accessed November 5, 2017).
14. “President Putin ‘Probably’ Approved Litvinenko Murder,” BBC, January 21, 2016, http://www.bbc.com/news/uk-35370819 (accessed November 5, 2017).
15. Noam Chomsky, “On the NATO Bombing of Yugoslavia,” interview by Danilo Mandic, RTS Online, April 25, 2006, https://chomsky.info/20060425/ (accessed October 26, 2017).
16. In November 2005, a British newspaper leaked a thus far unconfirmed secret report that purported that Tony Blair was able to convince George Bush not to bomb the Qatari TV station Al Jazeera in Doha in April 2004 during the US siege of Falluja in Iraq. Bush purportedly threatened to bomb Al Jazeera due to the fact that unembedded Al Jazeera journalists had been accusing the US military of atrocities. Jeremy Scahill, “Did Bush Really Want to Bomb Al Jazeera?” Nation, November 23, 2005, https://www.thenation.com/article/did-bush-really-want-bomb-al-jazeera/ (accessed October 26, 2017). Seymour M. Hersh, “Chain of Command,” New Yorker, May 17, 2004. In any case, the purpose of the leak seemed to be to make Blair look like a good guy who stood up to Bush, and not Bush's “poodle,” as was often claimed at the time.
17. Veteran Intelligence Professionals for Sanity (VIPS), “A Demand for Russian ‘Hacking’ Proof,” Consortium News, January 17, 2017, https://consortiumnews.com/2017/01/17/a-demand-for-russian-hacking-proof/. Here there should be a distinction between “cyber-leaks” and “cyber-hacking,” as it is not clear which the Kremlin is allegedly responsible for.
18. “Russia: The ‘Cloud’ over the White House,” BBC News, September 29, 2017, http://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-38966846 (accessed October 26, 2017).
19. Michelle Ye Hee Lee, “Julian Assange's Claim That There Was No Russian Involvement in WikiLeaks Emails,” Washington Post, January 5, 2017, https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/fact-checker/wp/2017/01/05/julian-assanges-claim-that-there-was-no-russian-involvement-in-wikileaks-emails/?utm_term=.563247ffca74 (accessed May 29, 2017).
20. Andrew Higgins, “Maybe Private Russian Hackers Meddled in Election, Putin Says,” New York Times, June 1, 2017, https://www.nytimes.com/2017/06/01/world/europe/vladimir-putin-donald-trump-hacking.html?emc=edit_na_20170601&nl=breaking-news&nlid=70196410&ref=cta&_r=0 (accessed October 26, 2017).
21. Sean Gallagher, “WikiLeaks to US Government: Stop Leaking Secrets! WikiLeaks Joins Trump in Decrying NBC ‘Exclusive’ on Top Secret Intelligence Report,” Ars Technica, January 6, 2017, https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2017/01/wikileaks-to-us-government-stop-leaking-secrets/ (accessed November 5, 2017). NBC, for example, illegally received a leaked document before Trump saw it, with no threat of punishment; yet Chelsea Manning was accused of “aiding the enemy” by handing over secret documents to Julian Assange.
22. FBI Director James Comey had announced a new inquiry into Clinton's private email server only eleven days before the presidential election, but then he dropped the issue just two days before Americans voted. It is possible that the Kremlin was involved in hacking Democratic National Committee emails, but other groups could have been involved as well, possibly in an effort to make Moscow look like the culprit. Alex Thompson, “Why Nothing Was Done,” Vice News, December 16, 2016, https://news.vice.com/story/obama-explains-why-he-didnt-retaliate-against-russia-for-hacking-hillary-clintons-campaign (accessed October 26, 2017).
23. Pamela Engel, “Clinton Never Set Foot in Wisconsin—Then She Lost It, and It Helped Cost Her the Presidency,” Business Insider, November 9, 2016, http://uk.businessinsider.com/clinton-losing-wisconsin-results-2016-11?r=US&IR=T (accessed October 26, 2017).
24. Jacob Heilbrunn, “It Was Inevitable That Trump Would Fire James Comey,” National Interest, May 9, 2017, http://nationalinterest.org/feature/it-was-inevitable-trump-would-fire-james-comey-20589 (accessed October 26, 2017). Ali Vitali and Corky Siemaszko, “Trump Interview with Lester Holt: President Asked Comey If He Was Under Investigation.”
For an analysis of Trump's interview with Lester Holt on NBC, see Amy Davidson Sorkin, “The Threat in President Trump's Interview with Lester Holt,” New Yorker, May 12, 2017, https://www.newyorker.com/news/amy-davidson/the-threat-in-president-trumps-interview-with-lester-holt (accessed November 5, 2017).
25. Maggie Haberman, Mark Mazzetti, and Matt Apuzzomay, “Kushner Is Said to Have Discussed a Secret Channel to Talk to Russia,” New York Times, May 26, 2017, https://www.nytimes.com/2017/05/26/us/politics/kushner-talked-to-russian-envoy-about-creating-secret-channel-with-kremlin.html?emc=edit_th_20170527&nl=todaysheadlines&nlid=70196410&_r=0 (accessed October 26, 2017). Jo Becker, Matt Apuzzo, and Adam Goldman, “Trump's Son Met with Russian Lawyer after Being Promised Damaging Information on Clinton,” New York Times, July 9, 2017, https://www.nytimes.com/2017/07/09/us/politics/trump-russia-kushner-manafort.html (accessed November 5, 2017).
26. See controversial report written by former British MI6 intelligence agent Christopher Steele, “Company Intelligence Report 2016/080: US Presidential Election: Republican Candidate Donald Trump's Activities in Russia and Compromising Relationship with the Kremlin,” available at https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/3259984-Trump-Intelligence-Allegations.html (accessed October 26, 2017). This unconfirmed report was passed around Washington before it was placed on BuzzFeed's website: Ken Bensinger, Miriam Elder, and Mark Schoofs, “These Reports Allege Trump Has Deep Ties to Russia,” BuzzFeed, January 10, 2017, https://www.buzzfeed.com/kenbensinger/these-reports-allege-trump-has-deep-ties-to-russia?utm_term=.mljnBG5rbp#.la3vMX57eJ (accessed November 2, 2017). By November 2017, “Clinton Campaign, DNC Paid for Research That Led to Russia Dossier,” Washington Post, https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/national-security/clinton-campaign-dnc-paid-for-research-that-led-to-russia-dossier/2017/10/24/226fabf0-b8e4-11e7-a908-a3470754bbb9_story.html?utm_term=.597105078b6b (accessed November 5, 2017).
27. For a critique of the Fusion GPS report, see Philip Bump, “What the Trump Dossier Says—and What It Doesn't,” Washington Post, October 25, 2017, https://www.
washingtonpost.com/news/politics/wp/2017/10/25/what-the-trump-dossier-says-and-what-it-doesnt/?tid=a_inl&utm_term=.a63e2e8cf802 (accessed November 5, 2017).
28. Mikhail Fishman, Daria Litvinova, “Why Putin Fired His Chief of Staff and Longtime Ally,” Moscow Times, August 25, 2016, https://themoscowtimes.com/articles/why-putin-replaced-head-of-presidential-administration-54978 (accessed October 26, 2017).
29. For a cautious view, see Fydor Lukyanov, “Like Obama, Trump Is Unlikely to Lead as the World's Policeman,” Russia in Global Affairs, November 18, 2016, http://eng.globalaffairs.ru/redcol/Like-Obama-Trump-Is-Unlikely-to-Lead-as-the-Worlds-Policeman-18466 (accessed October 26, 2017).
30. Bryan Logan, “Nikki Haley Just Delivered the Trump Administration's Most Hawkish Words Yet toward Russia,” Business Insider, February 3, 2017, http://uk.businessinsider.com/trump-nikki-haley-russia-ukraine-2017-2?r=US&IR=T (accessed October 26, 2017).
31. David M. Herszenhorn and Ellen Barrydec, “Putin Contends Clinton Incited Unrest Over Vote,” New York Times, December 8, 2011, http://www.nytimes.com/2011/12/09/world/europe/putin-accuses-clinton-of-instigating-russian-protests.html (accessed October 26, 2017).
32. Priyanka Boghani, “Putin's Legal Crackdown on Civil Society,” Frontline, January 13, 2015, http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/frontline/article/putins-legal-crackdown-on-civil-society/ (accessed October 26, 2017). Former US Ambassador Michael McFaul stated he personally heard Putin complain about Clinton's comments. Michael Crowley and Julia Ioffe, “Why Putin Hates Hillary,” Politico, July 25, 2016, http://www.politico.com/story/2016/07/clinton-putin-226153 (accessed October 26, 2017). In an effort to delegitimize Putin before the Russian people, Washington elites accused him of being a billionaire: Stephen Grey, Andrey Kuzmin, and Elizabeth Piper, “Putin's Daughter, a Young Billionaire and the President's Friends,” Reuters, November 10, 2015, http://www.reuters.com/investigates/special-report/russia-capitalism-daughters/ (accessed October 26, 2017).
