If You Want Peace, Prepare for War

The preeminent luxury belief is that defense companies are evil. I type this as our ally Israel is under attack by terrorist group Hamas. As our ally Ukraine is under attack by Russia. A basic truth that will always exist is the only way to ensure peace is for the good guys to have the biggest guns. There is no alternative. Bad actors will always exist. Adversaries who wish to destroy the American way of life and the way of life of our allies will always persist. “If you want peace, prepare for war.” This doesn’t mean supporting the defense companies no matter what. We should ask serious questions about how they operate and how taxpayer funds are allocated to them. It also doesn’t mean engaging in pointless unwinnable wars or infringing on the civil liberties of our citizens. What it does mean is we must have a culture of making the Department of Defense the best it can possibly be. Not simply writing it off as evil. Which our adversaries want nothing more than us to do. It means viewing Google deciding to not work with the DoD or the Israeli government as preposterous. Built on a false premise by radicals who have no idea how the world or humanity works.

The last 80 years of peace are no accident. The good guys, the US and her allies, have had the biggest guns. This must continue to be true for centuries to come. War only happens when one side believes they have a chance of winning. It must be abundantly clear to our adversaries there is absolutely no chance of winning. Fear must exist deep within them so we can maintain freedom. War is changing. The US military edge is declining. Our naval and conventional weapons supremacy matters less in a world where drone and cyber warfare are the new planes of attack. As Palmer Luckey, founder of defense startup Anduril says, there is more AI in Snapchat than in any US military assets. His company intends to change that. He says Anduril will “save the taxpayers hundreds of billions while making tens of billions.” He’s been attacked for building a defense startup. Attacked by those who turn their nose up at violence and war while completely ignoring the fact it is the natural state of humanity. Fight against what’s natural. Prepare for war.