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Part I: Blood Money and Broken Oaths — The War Machine’s Finest Minds – And Why They Failed Us
by Marivel Guznan |Akashma News
They walk among us, decorated in ribbons and stars. They hold degrees in strategy, military science, and global security. Men and women like Lt. Gen. William J. Hartman and Col. Laurie Buckhout—steeped in cyber warfare, intelligence command, and battlefield coordination. Their résumés read like a war college syllabus. Their service, decades long. Their minds, forged in the crucible of conflict.
On paper, these leaders are extraordinary. Seasoned generals. Cyber tacticians. National security architects. Yet despite all this, the United States has not won a war since Operation Desert Storm. And even that “victory” unraveled into decades of instability, emboldening warlords and birthing monsters like ISIS.
So we ask, with no malice—only urgency:
If the best-trained brass can’t win, what are they really fighting for?
Let’s break it down.
1. “Winning” Isn’t What It Used to Be
War has changed. Victory no longer ends with treaties or surrender. The modern battlefield is everywhere and nowhere—insurgents without flags, drones without borders, ideologies without nations.
Afghanistan. Iraq. Syria. Libya. The “enemy” shifts with each administration. So even the most skilled general fights a ghost with rules that vanish mid-battle.
And when the goal is ill-defined, or forever postponed, no one wins—except those selling the bullets.
2. Political Sabotage of Military Strategy
The brass may strategize—but execution belongs to Washington.
And in Washington, strategy is eclipsed by optics, reelection cycles, and lobbying dollars.
From the disastrous pullout of Iraq that gave rise to ISIS, to the haphazard withdrawal from Afghanistan that betrayed both U.S. soldiers and Afghan civilians—our wars have been sabotaged from within.
Generals follow orders. But what if the orders are designed to enrich friends, not to defend the nation?
3. Wars That Were Never Meant to Be Won
This is the hardest truth.
Afghanistan: 20 years, trillions spent, no intention to build a nation—just to rent one.
Iraq: Invaded on a lie. Left broken, bleeding, and looted.
Syria and Libya: Proxy wars ignited, populations destroyed, stability traded for oil corridors and arms sales.
As General Wesley Clark warned: “There was a plan to take out seven countries in five years.” If chaos was the goal, then mission accomplished. War wasn’t lost. It was repackaged as policy.
4. Bureaucracy, Corruption, and the Military-Industrial Complex
Even the most principled officers—like Hartman or Buckhout—can’t outmaneuver the system Eisenhower warned us about.
A swamp of overlapping agencies. Procurement games. “Consulting” gigs. Retired brass going from battlefield to boardroom. Raytheon. Lockheed. Palantir.
The medals might shine, but the system is rusted.
5. Cyberwarfare: A War Without Glory
Our modern heroes now fight in digital silence. No headlines. No parades. Just servers breached, satellites hijacked, grids disabled.
Hartman and Buckhout may be winning battles in cyber arenas we’ll never see—but without transparency, without accountability, the public can’t know what’s won, or what’s lost.
6. Strategy Without Soul
Even the most refined tactics collapse without just cause.
Vietnam. Iraq. Afghanistan. These weren’t wars of liberation. They were occupations disguised as peacekeeping.
Soldiers fought with honor—but the cause was hollow. And occupiers don’t win hearts. They ignite resistance.
So what’s the verdict?
The failure doesn’t lie in skill. It lies in the absence of truth, purpose, and restraint.
Our generals serve two masters—country and contract. And more often than not, they retire into the arms of the contractor who profits from the wars they once directed.
No PhD in war theory can redeem a battle fought for shareholders.
We opened with respect. We acknowledge the service, the dedication, the brilliance.
But now it’s time to flip the page.
Because behind every uniform is a shadow. Behind every “hero” is a name on a contract. And behind every failed war is a ledger soaked in blood.
Welcome to Part II Blood Money and Broken Oaths — How America’s Wars Were Lost to Greed.
Part II: Blood Money and Broken Oaths – How America’s Wars Were Lost to Greed
by Marivel Guzman | Akashma News
They said it was about freedom. They said it was about justice. They said it was about protecting American lives.
But the body count rose, the lies piled up, and the contracts multiplied.
Behind every failed operation, every smokescreen of national interest, and every “freedom mission” abroad—there was a ledger. And the names in those ledgers weren’t soldiers or widows. They were stockholders, politicians, former generals, and billionaires.
This is not anti-war rhetoric. This is forensic journalism. We follow the money. We follow the lies. And we follow the names.
I. The Bush Dynasty: Family Business Meets Foreign Invasion
George H.W. Bush – former CIA Director, oilman, war president. His company, Zapata Offshore, had connections to offshore drilling, Latin America operations, and covert interests.
George W. Bush – sat atop the nation in 2001, as oil executives and military contractors circled the wreckage of 9/11 like vultures. He handed the no-bid reconstruction contracts to Halliburton, formerly run by his vice president, Dick Cheney.
And then came the war built on a lie—Weapons of Mass Destruction—a falsehood pushed by political operatives and amplified by a willing press. The Bush-Cheney doctrine turned Iraq into a playground for profiteers.
II. Dick Cheney: Halliburton’s Shadow Commander
Vice President Cheney made millions from Halliburton stock options even after supposedly “severing ties.” In 2003 alone, Halliburton secured $7 billion in contracts from the U.S. government.
His fingerprints are everywhere:
KBR (Kellogg Brown & Root, a Halliburton subsidiary) billed billions for “reconstruction.”
Allegations of fraud, overcharging, and unsafe conditions for troops.
Private subcontractors like Blackwater (now Academi) acted as mercenary extensions of U.S. foreign policy—with legal immunity.
III. Congress for Sale: The Blood-Soaked Wallets on Capitol Hill
Congress didn’t just approve the wars—they invested in them.
Senator Dianne Feinstein: Her husband, Richard Blum, had stakes in military contractors that gained from Iraq contracts.
Rep. Mike Turner (R-OH): Longtime advocate of defense expansion, recipient of funds from Raytheon and Lockheed.
Dan Crenshaw (R-TX): Public military hero, private supporter of increased private security contracting. Multiple donations from defense PACs.
And let’s not forget Rep. Don Bacon (R-NE)—our cyber subcommittee chair. With decades of military service and political clout, he embodies the revolving door. No direct link to NSO Group or Palantir yet, but his pro-surveillance stances and cyber warfare lobbying track suggest he’s under corporate gravity.
Use OpenSecrets.org and Project on Government Oversight to track the steady stream of blood money funneled through campaign donations and insider contracts.
IV. When Generals Turn Into Guns-for-Hire
Gen. James Mattis: Board member of General Dynamics after his military career.
Gen. Stanley McChrystal: Became advisor to Palantir Technologies, a CIA-seeded surveillance company.
Gen. Michael Hayden: Ex-NSA director turned private consultant for Booz Allen Hamilton—the same firm Edward Snowden worked for when he exposed global surveillance.
They fought wars. Then they sold the playbook.
V. The Tech Profiteers: From Silicon Valley to Baghdad
Bill Gates: Not just the vaccine mogul—Microsoft technology undergirded U.S. digital surveillance and logistics systems in war zones. While Microsoft didn’t profit from boots-on-the-ground war, its infrastructure contracts in Iraq and Afghanistan were extensive.
Peter Thiel: Founder of Palantir, funded by In-Q-Tel, the CIA’s venture capital arm. Palantir’s predictive policing software was deployed in Iraq and on U.S. streets.
Jeff Bezos: Amazon’s AWS cloud bid for the JEDI war cloud contract—worth $10 billion—showed that today’s wars aren’t about tanks. They’re about data.
VI. The Looting of Iraq: $6.6 Billion Gone in Cash
Between 2003–2007, the U.S. “lost” $6.6 billion in cash meant for Iraq’s reconstruction. That money was flown in on pallets—literally—in C-130s, and vanished.
Where did it go? Corrupt Iraqi officials? American contractors? Halliburton vaults?
No accountability. No charges. No return.
VII. From Patriot Act to Panopticon
With the ink still wet from the Twin Towers’ collapse, Congress passed the Patriot Act, giving birth to:
NSA mass surveillance.
Fusion centers spying on Americans.
Corporate surveillance networks with no oversight.
Big Tech, security firms, and retired brass cashed in. And the American people were told: “If you have nothing to hide, you have nothing to fear.”
Meanwhile, the architects of fear had everything to gain.
VIII. Conclusion: The Road to Treason Is Paved with Contracts
America didn’t lose its wars because of incompetence. It lost them because winning was never the goal.
The Pentagon became a piggy bank. Congress a stock exchange. And the generals? Many became consultants, CEOs, and lobbyists.
They served money, not country. And money, as we know, doesn’t need a passport to move through the doors of corruption.
So we name them. We trace the dollars. And we demand that history stop calling them patriots when they were, in truth, profiteers.
In Part III, we’ll break down timelines, show document trails, and map the full revolving door from war zones to corporate boardrooms.
Welcome to Part III: Blood Money and Btoken Oaths: The Empire’s Ledger – Mapping the Timeline of Treason
Part IV: Blood Money and Broken Oaths: Collateral Empire – The Civilian Toll and the Future of Resistance
by Marivel Guzman | Akashma News
“They died for freedom,” the politician says.
But whose freedom? Certainly not theirs.
I. The Myth of Precision and the Reality of Ashes
They called it precision warfare.
They promised “smart bombs.”
But what they delivered was mass death—unaccounted, unpunished, and largely undocumented.
According to IraqBodyCount.org, between 187,499 and 211,046 civilians have been documented killed by violence since the 2003 U.S.-led invasion.
Further analysis of WikiLeaks’ Iraq War Logs may add another 10,000 names to that ledger of loss.
Invading armies rarely excel at local mathematics—or at honoring the logistical heartbeat of a nation.
Markets became “targets of opportunity.” Ambulances became suspicious. Homes became war zones.
And in every crater, a truth buried:
This was not precision. This was policy.
Afghanistan: At least 70,000 civilians killed.
Syria, Libya, Somalia, Yemen: death tolls climbing, often uncounted.
Drone strikes: 90% of victims in some campaigns were not the intended targets.
“Collateral damage,” they called it.
Entire villages vaporized. Weddings bombed. Hospitals shelled.
No apologies. No trials. Just silence and the next press conference.
II. The Refugee Crisis: Manufactured Exodus
By 2022, U.S.-backed wars and destabilization campaigns had displaced over 38 million people—more than any conflict since World War II.
Iraqis flooded Jordan, Syria, and Europe.
Afghans clung to C-17s during evacuation.
Libyan migrants drowned off the Mediterranean coast after NATO’s intervention.
Syrians sought refuge from both U.S. airstrikes and U.S.-armed militias.
And while borders closed, the same governments who caused the exodus tightened asylum laws.
Militarized borders became the next frontier for profit.
III. Psychological War: Civilian Trauma as Policy
It’s not just bombs that wound. It’s what comes after.
PTSD rates among civilians in Iraq and Afghanistan exceed those of U.S. veterans.
Suicide, drug addiction, domestic violence—a quiet epidemic in rubble cities.
Schools bombed. Power grids sabotaged. Childhoods swallowed by sirens and fear.
This isn’t war. It’s social engineering through destruction. Break a population’s spirit, then offer “reconstruction” tied to debt, surveillance, and privatized aid.
IV. The New Colonies: NGOs, Contractors, and Vultures
After the last Humvee rolls out, the real occupation begins.
USAID becomes the soft hand of the Pentagon.
NGOs distribute food—but collect data.
Western contractors rebuild what they helped destroy—on the same taxpayer tab.
In Iraq, U.S. firms made $138 billion during “reconstruction.”
In Afghanistan, $19 billion went missing through fraud, waste, or abuse.
The locals get checkpoints and corruption.
The West gets contracts and stock options.
V. Domestic Casualties: The Forgotten Veterans and Homeland Decay
The war came home, too.
Over 30,000 U.S. post-9/11 veterans have died by suicide.
The VA is underfunded, overrun, and riddled with bureaucracy.
Tens of thousands of veterans live homeless, addicted, or disenfranchised.
While Boeing builds bombs, American bridges collapse.
While Palantir surveils war zones, U.S. schools go unfunded.
While Raytheon stock rises, insulin prices keep climbing.
This isn’t defense. It’s organized theft.
Part V: Blood Money and Broken Oaths —Naming the War Lords – Profiles of Power, Profit, and Permanent War
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