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War is a Racket: The Antiwar Classic by America's Most Decorated Soldier Paperback – Illustrated, April 1, 2003

by Smedley D. Butler (Author), Adam Parfrey (Introduction)

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General Smedley Butler’s frank book shows how American war efforts were animated by big-business interests. This extraordinary argument against war by an unexpected proponent is relevant now more than ever.

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Product details

Item Weight : 3.56 ounces
Paperback : 80 pages
ISBN-10 : 0922915865
ISBN-13 : 978-0922915866
Product Dimensions : 5.38 x 0.2 x 8.25 inches
Publisher : Feral House; Revised ed. edition (April 1, 2003)
Language: : English

Best Sellers Rank: #149,557 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
- #48 in War & Peace (Books)
- #165 in Nationalism (Books)
- #180 in United States Military Veterans History

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T. wilson

The Butler Did IT! Unmasking the War Racket!

Reviewed in the United States on May 21, 2018

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Required reading for the current time and times past. Smedley Butler was a brave, rousing, American soldier. His experiences and observations from the 1930s, echo into many foreign and domestic policies and hotspots making headlines today. It's sort of like a confession of an economic hitman 40 years before John Perkins wrote his book. It's daring and threadbare in showing the unvarnished aftermath and policies that guided men and nations to war then, before then, and today. Until the 1950s, this book was in American classrooms. It still ought to be. Since it printing, little of its force has been lost.

14 people found this helpful

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John Bell

80 years since publication in 1936 ... remains the best analysis on war. A winner!

Reviewed in the United States on February 28, 2016

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I’d heard of this book >25 years ago but only recently opened it. It is a powerful dissertation on the ultimate causes of war (financial enrichment), the payers (taxpayers), the winners (bankers & politicians), the losers (every human, even of the winning side). Instead of bring booty and riches war always brings debt & broken bodies … all well discussed.

The writing is tight and direct. Butler, having personally witnessing war doesn’t mince words in discussing and horror of it all. His dissertation is dropped right into the reader’s lap disallowing him to squirm away. Although written over 80 years ago it remains tops in the ultimate analysis of war.

Not discussed is Butler’s transition from warmonger to peacemaker. Also not discussed is how war breeds anger-hatred-xenophobia and primes the people of the winning side for the next war.

There are 4 quotes not mentioned in this book that needs ventilation

• I am tired and sick of war. Its glory is all moonshine. It is only those who have neither fired a shot nor heard the shrieks and groans of the wounded who cry aloud for blood, for vengeance, for desolation. War is hell. Sherman

• Of all the enemies of liberty, war is the most dreaded, because it is the germ of every other. War is the parent of armies; from these precede debts and taxes; and armies, debts, and taxes are the instruments for bringing the many under the domination of the few. In war the discretionary power of the Executive is extended — all the means of seducing the minds, are added to those of subduing the force, of the people. No nation can preserve its freedom in the midst of continual warfare. Madison, 1787

• To convince the people that war is necessary all you have to do is tell them they are being attacked, and denounce the peace makers for lack of patriotism and exposing the country to danger. It works the same in every country. H. Goering

• Every war when it comes, or before it comes, is presented not as a war but as an act of self-defense against a homicidal maniac. Orwell

War is the ultimate malignancy.

22 people found this helpful

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The Info Hunter

This could have been written last week.

Reviewed in the United States on May 31, 2016

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Apparently, some things are timeless in the "military-industrial racket".
General Smedley Butler, the most decorated American soldier probably ever, points out in this essay some MIC moves that remind the reader of skullduggery in the Iraq War, Vietnam War, etc.
Long before General Eisenhower's classic speech, General Butler sounded the alarm.

I guess leave it to the soldiers to be able to spot this stuff.

Great read, highly recommended.

16 people found this helpful

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Colin A. Brodd

A stirring anti-war classic!

Reviewed in the United States on February 4, 2020

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I must say I do not believe in everything Butler professes. He was a strict isolationist who regretted our involvement in the first World War and wrote opposing out involvement in the second - a position I cannot admire. He also speaks of the need to America to "cut loose" possessions like Puerto Rico - I fear without much consideration for the effects that would have, or the wishes of those American citizens who would lose their citizenship. BUT Butler does speak compellingly of the "racket" of war, of those who profit by it while others sacrifice and die and bear the burden. He speaks especially of the toll on soldiers, of the mental and emotional costs, not to mention physical injury and death, paid so that others may profit. Definitely worth reading, even if I do not agree with all of it. Highly recommended.

3 people found this helpful

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Luc REYNAERT

Profit explosions for the few, heavy burdens for the many

Reviewed in the United Kingdom on June 16, 2016

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In this vehement and all-important pamphlet Brigadier General Smedley Darlington Butler unveils the real winners behind the war machine: the owners of the corporations producing the war machinery (from food for the soldiers to mining companies, weapon producers and their bankers).

The author stigmatizes war as a perfect racket by the very few at the expense of the very many, where ‘the profits are reckoned in dollars and the losses in lives and taxes’. The general public shoulders the bill: ‘newly placed gravestones, mangled bodies, shattered minds, broken hearts and homes, economic instability and back-breaking taxation for generations’.

‘Not the people – not those who fight and pay and die – are looking for war, only those who remain safely at home to profit’. But, war propaganda makes people war and murder conscious. Even clergymen join in the clamor to kill: ‘God is on our side … on both sides!’

S. D. Butler proposes a draconian, but unfortunately, utopian solution to stop the racket: let the high-powered executives of factories, companies and banks who profit in wartime, be conscripted at the same wage as the lads in the trenches and the workers in their plants; and, let the generals and the politicians be restricted to a total monthly income not to exceed a soldier’s pay.

Politically, Smedley D. Butler vehemently believes that three measures should be imposed: take profit out of war; permit the youth who would bear arms to decide whether or not there should be war and, limit our military forces to home defense purposes only.

This violent diatribe is a must read for all men and women of good will.

6 people found this helpful

Dr. Michael J. Cross

An exposure of the purpose for war... even world war.

Reviewed in the United Kingdom on August 29, 2014

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This books rings true and reminds me of conversations between my parents when I lived in London 60 years ago. At that time they discussed the way certain insignificant businesses built them selves up on wartime supplies to become quite large by the end of the war. The implication of this was that profiteering was taking place during the Second World War, which makes me wonder whether this was done with the connivance of the government.

When they state (in 2014) that we are "all in it together", naturally it is a reference to the fact that they "All have their fingers in the till together". It is not realistic to suppose that the corruption that we all see so plainly in African countries does not take place here in the UK. I remember a Nigerian saying to me when I commented on problems with corruption in Nigeria, that "We had very good teachers", referring to the British in Nigeria having their hands in the till before the Africans got there.

Hence the book explains the opportunity that a war provides for ripping off the public, and if you read material elsewhere, you will discover that both world wars were started by rich people for that precise purpose... to enrich themselves. This was discussed extensively during my early childhood, and we were not a politically-connected family.

9 people found this helpful

joe c

Essential reading for anyone who wonders why we fight so many wars.

Reviewed in the United Kingdom on July 18, 2018

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A short, but effective book detailing the real reason we send young men to fight and die in unnecessary wars. Butler outlines his opinion with authority, and I think this book is essential reading - if a fraction of our leaders had this man's integrity, bloody conflicts for greed and hegemony would be a thing of the past.

One person found this helpful

RickyB

Interesting viewpoint.

Reviewed in the United Kingdom on September 5, 2014

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A good introduction about what goes on behind the scenes once war starts. Also an explanation of why the USA should stay out of wars. Having said this I feel it was a book written for its time. The world is a different place from the two World Wars. Still a very good read.

David Wilkinson

The rest of humanity pick up the pieces

Reviewed in the United Kingdom on August 10, 2018

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Yes war is racket only the rich profit. The rest of humanity pick up the pieces.