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Andrew Bacevich Biography

Andrew Bacevich

Andrew J. Bacevich, Sr. (born July 5, 1947) is an American historian specializing in international relations, security studies, American foreign policy, and American diplomatic and military history. He is a Professor Emeritus of International Relations and History at the Boston University Frederick S. Pardee School of Global Studies. He is also a retired career officer in the Armor Branch of the United States Army, retiring with the rank of Colonel. He is a former director of Boston University's Center for International Relations (from 1998 to 2005), now part of the Pardee School of Global Studies.

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Andrew Bacevich Quotes

Ideology makes people stupid.

Stupid, People, Ideology

Memorial Day orators will say that a G. I. 's life is priceless. Don't believe it. I know what value the U. S. government assigns to a soldier's life: I've been handed the check. It's roughly what the Yankees will pay Roger Clemens per inning once he starts pitching next month.

Believe, Government, Life, Memorial Day, Per, Yankees

The U. S. has become a defacto one-party state, with the legislative branch permanently controlled by an incumbent's party and every president exploiting his role as Commander-in-Chief to expand on the imperial prerogatives of his office.

Party, Office, President, Become, Permanently

We are squandering our wealth in many respects, to the extent that we persist in our imperial delusions, we're also going to squander our freedom.

Delusion, Delusions, Extent, Freedom, Squandering, Wealth

It's not so much the amount of tax we pay - it's the sense that our pocket's being picked without our knowing what's going on.

Amount, Knowing, Pay, Picked, Pockets

Apart from a commendable determination to discomfit Trump and members of his inner circle (select military figures excepted, at least for now), journalism remains pretty much what it was prior to November 8th of last year: personalities built up only to be torn down; fads and novelties discovered, celebrated, then mocked; "extraordinary" stories of ordinary people granted 15 seconds of fame only to once again be consigned to oblivion - all served with a side dish of that day's quota of suffering, devastation, and carnage. These remain journalism's stock-in-trade.

Determination, Granted, Military, People, Remain, Trump

Are there any military actions that the president of the United States may not order on his own authority? If so, what are they? Bit by bit, decade by decade, Congress has abdicated its assigned role in authorizing war. Today, it merely rubberstamps what presidents decide to do (or simply stays mum). Who does this deference to an imperial presidency benefit? Have U. S. policies thereby become more prudent, enlightened, and successful?

Military, War, Successful, United, Authority, Congress

The U. S. military today garrisons the planet in a fashion without historical precedent. Successive administrations, regardless of party, justify and perpetuate this policy by insisting that positioning U. S. forces in distant lands fosters peace, stability, and security. In the present century, however, perpetuating this practice has visibly had the opposite effect. In the eyes of many of those called upon to "host" American bases, the permanent presence of such forces smacks of occupation. They resist. Why should U. S. policymakers expect otherwise?

Fashion, Military, Party, Distant, Planet, Administrations

Time and again-from the collapse of the Soviet Union to the events of 9
11 to the onset of the Arab Spring-events have caught the experts, whether in government or on the outside, completely by surprise. Business owners with comparable performance records go bust. Brokers lose their clients. Physicians get sued for malpractice. Yet think-tankers and policy wonks continue to opine, never pausing to reflect on-or apologize for-their spotty records.

Comparable, Experts, Government, Reflect, Spring, Thinking

Sometimes, when you can't fix the problem on your own, you need to make some compromises and find the partners who can get the job done for you.

Jobs, Needs, Done, Problem, Job

The folly and hubris of the policy makers who heedlessly thrust the nation into an ill-defined and open-ended 'global war on terror' without the foggiest notion of what victory would look like, how it would be won, and what it might cost approached standards hitherto achieved only by slightly mad German warlords.

Mad, Slightly, Standards, Victory, War

In present-day America, expressing reverence for those who serve in uniform is something akin to a religious obligation. Everyone professes to cherish America's "warriors. " Yet such bountiful, if superficial, expressions of regard camouflage a growing gap between those who serve and those who applaud from the sidelines. Our present-day military system, based on the misnamed All-Volunteer Force, is neither democratic nor effective. Why has discussion and debate about its deficiencies not found a place among the nation's political priorities?

America, Camouflage, Military, Religious, Warrior

The United States military is undoubtedly the world's finest. It's also far and away the most generously funded, with policymakers offering U. S. troops no shortage of opportunities to practice their craft. So why doesn't this great military ever win anything? Or put another way, why in recent decades have those forces been unable to accomplish Washington's stated wartime objectives? Why has the now 15-year-old war on terror failed to result in even a single real success anywhere in the Greater Middle East?

Military, Real, War, Single, Stated

As a kid I was enamored with fiction, most of it utterly forgettable and long forgotten.

Kids, Long, Fiction, Enamored, Kid, Forgotten

If any overarching conclusion emerges from the Afghan and Iraq Wars (and from their Israeli equivalents), it's this: victory is a chimera.

War, Iraq, Victory, Israeli, Overarching