Quote by Charles Wright Mills on Peace, War, and Political Power

""My brother-in-law, Charles Bruggmann, told me about some friends who were in Dublin, Ireland, recently. At a social gathering were present several Jesuit priests who indicated that one of their supreme purposes was to bring about a war between the United States and Russia. Later on I began to speculate about the forces that are interested in trying to bring about such a war. In addition to a small group in the Catholic hierarchy there is also a small group among the English Tories and a small group in the American Army... a small group among the American big-business hierarchy, a substantial group among the Chinese Nationalists, the London Poles, and in general the more wealthy people who live in the countries close to Russia. Also there is a small group in the Navy (note for example Admiral Stark’s statement in the Pearl Harbor hearings with regard to communism being a greater danger than Naziism); also there should be included in this group a very strong element in the Republican Party. All of these people feel that it is only by the United States whipping Russia that they have a chance to maintain their present position in life. Against this group is found the peace-loving people everywhere. Unfortunately, the love of peace is a general sentiment and doesn’t bind people together in the same way as hatred binds together those who are intent on producing war between specific countries. The bulk of the Catholics, the bulk of the British, and the bulk of the common people everywhere do not want a third world war. These various groups that want a third world war in order to lick Russia are not at the present time working together but as time goes on they will tend more and more to coalesce. This is the great danger of the future."" Henry A. Wallace

"America—a conservative country without any conservative ideology—appears now before the world a naked and arbitrary power, as, in the name of realism, its men of decision enforce their often crackpot definitions upon world reality. The second-rate mind is in command of the ponderously spoken platitude. In the liberal rhetoric, vagueness, and in the conservative mood, irrationality, are raised to principle. Public relations and the official secret, the trivializing campaign and the terrible fact clumsily accomplished, are replacing the reasoned debate of political ideas in the privately incorporated economy, the military ascendancy, and the political vacuum of modern America." Charles Wright Mills