Smedley Butler

“War is a racket. It always has been.”

“I spent 33 years and four months in active military service and during that period I spent most of my time as a high class muscle man for Big Business, for Wall Street and the bankers. In short, I was a racketeer, a gangster for capitalism.”

“A racket is best described, I believe, as something that is not what it seems to the majority of the people. Only a small 'inside' group knows what it is about. It is conducted for the benefit of the very few, at the expense of the very many.”

“I helped make Mexico and especially Tampico safe for American oil interests in 1914. I helped make Haiti and Cuba a decent place for the National City Bank boys to collect revenues in.”

“I helped in the raping of half a dozen Central American republics for the benefit of Wall Street.”

“There are only two things we should fight for. One is the defense of our homes and the other is the Bill of Rights.”

“Looking back on it, I might have given Al Capone a few hints. The best he could do was to operate his racket in three districts. I operated on three continents.”

“It is possibly the oldest, easily the most profitable, surely the most vicious. It is the only one international in scope. It is the only one in which the profits are reckoned in dollars and the losses in lives.”

“I helped purify Nicaragua for the International Banking House of Brown Brothers in 1902-1912. I brought light to the Dominican Republic for the American sugar interests in 1916.”

“To hell with war!”

“Beautiful ideals were painted for our boys who were sent out to die. This was the 'war to end all wars.' This was the 'war to make the world safe for democracy.' No one told them that dollars and cents were the real reason.”

“Out of war nations acquire additional territory, if they are victorious. They just take it. This newly acquired territory promptly is exploited by the few–the selfsame few who wrung dollars out of blood in the war.”

“War for any other reason is simply a racket.”

“In China in 1927 I helped see to it that Standard Oil went on its way unmolested.”

“Let the officers and the directors and the high-powered executives of our armament factories...be conscripted to get $30 a month, the same wage as the lads in the trenches get.”