ENDLESS WAR

"Agon": Greek for conflict.
"Pent": Held in, not released.
"Pentagon": Conflict that isn't allowed
to go away.

[Note: Our military-industrial complex seems to prefer to have a war going on, hot or cold. Some would argue it's really the intelligence-industrial complex. Some military higher-ups prefer peace, and we've usually had relatively peaceful periods with ex-generals as president. They've seen enough of war.

But I think it's fair to say the Pentagon is part of a complex organization that has vested interests not necessarily shared by most of the citizens of this nation. It was wonderfully opportune, the way our leaders and talking heads, after being staggered (caught with their war down) by the sudden disappearance of the Cold War, when the much bally-hooed Soviet might went bankrupt--wonderfully opportune how, after a bit of waffling, they were able to pull out of their hats (or other less aromatic orifices) this War on Terrorism, a war that, almost by definition, can never end.

That seems to have been the game for a long time, by the way: To create a war that can go on indefinitely, requiring vast expenditures on weaponry and other military-related products (and profits for those who produce them and their symbiotes) that never end. After all, something like World War II is too much--might destroy everyone's profits. And live slaves are more useful than dead ones...if only slightly. But a COLD WAR with lots of little offshoot wars far away in the "third world"--that can go on forever, they (some they, the "they" that has usurped that pronoun) hoped.

A War on Terror has zero limits. One can always create more terrorists. In fact, everything we do to defeat terrorists is likely to create more. And in the absence of "real" terrorists, we can always blow something up and attribute it to terrorists--as Goering and Hitler well knew.

Our pentagony goes on (agon and agon, a gun and a gun, aggh! Never a gain?)]

[Note: As you probably know, the actual derivation of "Pentagon" = five (penta) corners or angles (the "gon"). It's about a building, not our pent up conflicts, nor is it the price tag on my pen.]
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Dean Blehert
Blogs:
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