Beskrivning
Beskrivning
This is a hard-hitting expose of the world’s largest, and most well-funded military contractor. William Hartung’s enthralling expose examines the far ranging tentacles of America’s largest, most well funded military contractor, Lockheed Martin. When President Dwight D. Eisenhower gave his famous warning about the dangers of the military-industrial complex, he never would have dreamed that a single company could accumulate the kind of power and influence that is now wielded by this behemoth military contractor. As a full-service weapons maker, Lockheed Martin receives over $25 billion per year in Pentagon contracts, or roughly one out of every ten dollars the Department of Defense doles out to private contractors a year. From aircraft and munitions, to the abysmal Star Wars missile defense program, to the spy satellites that the NSA has used to monitor American phone calls without their knowledge, Lockheed Martin’s reach into all areas of US defense and American life is staggering.”Prophets of War” chronicles the growth of Lockheed Martin into one of the most influential corporations in the world, and examines the pivotal role the company has had in America’s metastasizing military industrial complex. ”Prophets of War” also exposes Lockheed Martin’s hand in numerous scandals – from war profiteering during Vietnam, to bribes to officials in Germany, the Netherlands, France and Japan in exchange for the purchase of Lockheed airplanes in the 1970s. How has one company become the recipient of such a large portion of America’s tax dollars through contracts with the Pentagon, NASA, the Department of Homeland Security, the Department of Energy, the NSA, even the US Postal Service and the IRS? Bill Hartung’s meticulous, hard-hitting history follows Lockheed Martin’s meteoric growth and unravels how this arms industry giant has shaped US foreign policy for decades.
