US/Department/Defense
See also US/Military.
The United States Department of Defense was formerly referred to as the US War Department, and is the coordinator of the US/Military.
Contents
Concerns
The department has assisted the growth of the US deep state, for example through the Office of Special Operations. It overexaggerated the military readiness of the USSR in the Cold War and has spent a steadily larger and larger fraction of the US government's income on weapons, irrespective of the lack of real military threat to the USA. It cannot be understood in isolation from the Military-industrial-congressional complex spoken about by President Eisenhower.
History
The United States Congress created the War Department in 1789 and the Navy Department in 1798. The secretaries of each of these departments reported directly to the President as cabinet-level advisors.
In a special message to Congress on December 19, 1945, President Harry Truman proposed creation of a unified department of state defense, citing both wasteful military spending and inter-departmental conflicts. Deliberations in Congress went on for months focusing heavily on the role of the military in society and the threat of granting too much military power to the executive.[1]
9/11
On June 1, 2001, the DoD changed the rules for military assistance relating to aircraft hijackings, the first time since 1997, to state that for all non-immediate responses, assistance from the DoD must get personal approval from the Secretary of Defense, Donald Rumsfeld.[2]
Criticism
In 2009, the DoD faced criticism after referring to "protest" as "low-level terrorism".[3]
The DoD has faced criticism about its program of distributing surplus military equipment to US police forces. In 2014, Los Angeles Unified school police officials returned three grenade launchers to the military, although they kept the M-16 rifles and the armored vehicle.[4]
An event carried out
| Event | Location | Description |
|---|---|---|
| REX-84 | US | Scenario and drill developed by the United States federal government to detain large numbers of United States residents deemed to be "national security threats" in the event that the president declared a National Emergency (martial law). |
Legal Case
| Name | Plaintiff(s) | Defendant(s) | Start | End | Description |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Hedges v. Obama | Daniel Ellsberg Chris Hedges Noam Chomsky Jenifer Bolen Kai Wargalla Birgitta Jónsdóttir Alexa O'Brien | Barack Obama Leon Panetta John McCain John Boehner Harry Reid Eric Cantor Nancy Pelosi US/Department/Defense Mitch McConnell US | 13 January 2012 | 28 April 2014 | The plaintiffs challenged the 2012 NDAA contending that indefinite detention on "suspicion of providing substantial support" to groups such as al-Qaeda and the Taliban was so vague as to allow unconstitutional, indefinite detention of civilians based on vague allegations. The Court of Appeals struck down an initial agreement, and the US Supreme Court concurred, arguing that the plaintiffs could not prove they would be affected by the law, so had no standing to contest it. |
A Document by US/Department/Defense
| Title | Document type | Publication date | Subject(s) |
|---|---|---|---|
| File:Defense Strategic Guidance.pdf | report | January 2012 | US/Military |
An example
| Page name | Description |
|---|---|
| DARPA |
References
- ↑ Hogan, Michael J. (2000). A cross of iron: Harry S. Truman and the origins of the national security state, 1945-1954. Cambridge University Press. pp. 37–38. ISBN 978-0-521-79537-1.
- ↑ http://killtown.911review.org/oddities/2001.html
- ↑ http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,526972,00.html
- ↑ http://www.latimes.com/local/lanow/la-me-schools-weapons-20140917-story.html
