The Effects of the Times on a Man's Argument of War

Stephen Staples in 2000 published an article entitled The Relationship Between Globalization and Militarism. He argues that the extension of large corporations, especially defense and arms manufacturers, fuels the fire of war that burns all around the globe. Interestingly enough, he wrote this article the year before a radical terrorist group launched an assault on the United States. Features of Mr. Staples’s argument would definitely have been influenced in a variety of ways had he written and published the article after the 9/11 attacks, that is assuming he decided to even maintain the same argument.

One argument Staples makes is that corporations that manufacture weapons are expanding their business from nation to nation, making more readily available the means to start and fight a war to small interest groups such as rebels fighting a civil war. However, the hijackings of September 11th prove that weapons made by such companies aren’t absolutely necessary in instigating war. Evidence shows that the men who took over the flights that crashed into the World Trade Center, the Pentagon, and Pennsylvania only used box-cutters to complete their mission. It seems that relative to the time (kairos) in which Mr. Staples wrote, his argument seemed substantial in accusing large corporations of weapons manufacturers. However, such an accusation would not have held much ground post-9/11.

Staples also implemented the use of statistics in his article, particularly to illustrate how much money our country spends on military and defense operations. However, after the terrorist attacks in 2001, there were deafening cries for retaliation and retribution. Many people temporarily adopted a Machiavellian way of thinking towards the government’s military spending habits and what they saw as “making things right”: it doesn’t matter what it takes to get there, let’s just get some payback. Staples’s appeal to the human eye’s fixation with the dollar-sign was definitely stronger in the time when he wrote the article than if he had written in a time where people just wanted President Bush to do something about 9/11.

Though the effects of 9/11 would seemingly be detrimental to Staples’s argument, there is also a way he could make his point even sharper. After the World Trade Center fell, the U.S. was turned back on to military mode and most likely many weapons manufacturers jumped at the chance to be significant suppliers to the military and take advantage of the situation to become “the company that fought the war on terror.” Staples could underline this fact, that arms corporations used the deaths of thousands to turn a profit and possibly exacerbated the situation by giving America the means to fight a bigger war than it would have fought had there been less of a pool of suppliers to chose from who were willing to make thousands of bombs and tanks.

On the whole, Staples’s article would have been looked at in a completely different light after 9/11 than in 2000 when it was actually published. And yet, just a few years after 9/11, his article could have been even more powerful than in 2000 with Bush’s approval rating plummeting and most congressmen and citizens lamenting our involvement in first Afghanistan and then Iraq. The effects of kairos without a doubt contribute to the strength of Mr. Staples’s article.

Citation
Steven Staples, "The Relationship Between Globalization and Militarism," Social Justice, vol. 27, Winter 2000, p. 18. Copyright G 2000 by the Crime and Social Justice Associates.