Daniel Ellsberg: “A failed war is as profitable as a winning one.”
“It’s the old Latin catchphrase, cui bono, who benefits? Going back to wars you could name in the last century,” says Pentagon Papers whistleblower and renowned anti-war activist Daniel Ellsberg.
In 1971, Ellsberg, then a military analyst, leaked to the press a top-secret 7,000-page Pentagon study that uncovered years of official lies about US military involvement in the Vietnam War.
Ellsberg, and many like him, hoped that these revelations could change the way the world viewed the war. But decades later, with conflicts in Ukraine, Yemen, and Ethiopia, to name a few, the decision-making behind the wars remains murky as ever.
So who benefits from these wars?
War is “very profitable for the people who supply those weapons to keep it going,” says Ellsberg.
This week, Pentagon Papers whistleblower, anti-war activist, and author Daniel Ellsberg joins Marc Lamont Hill for a In the front a special look at the biggest players behind the global war machine.