Obsession for National Security and the Rise of the National Security State-Industry: A...

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Pastoral Psychology ISSN 0031-2789Volume 61Number 1 Pastoral Psychol (2012) 61:31-46DOI 10.1007/s11089-011-0380-5

Obsession for National Security andthe Rise of the National Security State-Industry: A Pastoral-Psychological Analysis

Ryan LaMothe

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Obsession for National Security and the Riseof the National Security State-Industry:A Pastoral-Psychological Analysis

Ryan LaMothe

Published online: 31 May 2011# Springer Science+Business Media, LLC 2011

Abstract In this article, I examine, from a pastoral-psychological perspective, the U.S.obsession with national security and the corresponding rise and consequences of themilitary-industrial complex and national security state-industry. I argue that preoccupationwith national security reflects a paranoid-schizoid (P-S) mode of organizing experience—amode of experience supported by and represented in political policies and discourse, as wellas socially shared narratives and myths. This subjective and intersubjective mode oforganizing experience, which is maintained by the defenses of projection, rationalization,moralization, splitting, and denial, accompany the eclipse of the reflective function. From atheological perspective, the obsession for national security signifies both an idolatrousrelationship and the presence of bad faith.

Keywords National security . Paranoid-Schizoid . Idolatry . Bad faith

A King is not saved by his great army;A warrior is not delivered by his great strength.The warhorse is a vain hope for victoryAnd by its great might it cannot save. Psalm 33:16–17

For not in my bow do I trust,Nor can my sword save me. Psalm 44:6

Introduction

In a satirical rally on the Washington Mall, Stephen Colbert and Jon Stewart led a march to“Keep Fear Alive.” Beneath the humor is the stark reality of a culture of fear that has been

Pastoral Psychol (2012) 61:31–46DOI 10.1007/s11089-011-0380-5

R. LaMothe (*)Pastoral Care and Counseling, St. Meinrad Seminary and School of Theology, 200 Hill Dr., St. Meinrad,IN 47577, USAe-mail: [email protected]

Author's personal copy

part of our social and political landscape for decades. U.S. citizens are fortunate to havepoliticians, political pundits, military analysts, preachers, and super-patriots who provide arich repast of things and people to fear. Instances of this abound. During the late 19th andearly 20th centuries, many politicians and media leaders portrayed Socialists as traitorswhose aims were to undermine democracy and capitalism. After WWII, the Soviet Unionand all other Communists were feared because citizens were told that all Communists werebent on the destruction of “our way of life.” Specters of nuclear war fueled anxiety and fear,and this resulted in incredible amounts of financial and human resources used to wage theCold War in the name of national security. More recently, terrorists, illegal immigrants, Iran,and North Korea have become objects of fear, falling under the banner of threats to nationalsecurity. In the U.S., keeping fear alive goes hand in glove with maintaining the drumbeatof national security. The sacred and unquestionable dogma of national security hasaccompanied the rise of what President Eisenhower called the military-industrial complex,as well as the more recent rise of a national security state and industry.1

In this article, I examine, from a pastoral-psychological perspective, the U.S. obsessionwith national security and the corresponding rise and consequences of the military-industrial complex and national security state-industry. I begin with a definition of nationalsecurity—its history and use of the term—and a description of its consequences. This isfollowed by a psychoanalytic assessment wherein I argue that preoccupation with nationalsecurity reflects a paranoid-schizoid (P-S) mode of organizing experience, which issupported by and represented in political policies and discourse, as well as socially sharednarratives and myths. This subjective and intersubjective mode of organizing experience,which is maintained by the defenses of projection, rationalization, moralization, splitting,and denial, accompanies the eclipse of the reflective function. I conclude with a theologicalcritique arguing that the obsession for national security signifies both an idolatrousrelationship and the presence of bad faith.

Before beginning, I would like to address, if only briefly, a question that arises when apastoral analysis is proffered. For many people, a pastoral-psychological perspective mayinitially appear to be an odd, if not questionable, approach to issues of national security,economics, and the military. My response is twofold. First, pastoral-psychologicalperspectives and analyses of larger social-political and economic realities have not beenwidely represented in pastoral care and counseling literature, though macro issues havebeen addressed in political theologies (Gutierrez 1985; Moltmann 1973; Sobrino 1984) andpost-colonial theologies (Min 2004; Reiger 2003).

My second response involves a brief synopsis of what I mean by a pastoral-psychological analysis, which, in my view, points to its relevance for the discipline andthe larger public discourse. A pastoral-psychological analysis involves using human scienceand theological theories and concepts to 1) assess political, social, and economic structures,dynamics, behaviors, policies, and systems in terms of their impact on diverse forms ofhuman suffering (e.g., physical, social, psychological, and spiritual), 2) evaluate how thesepolitical, economic, and social systems contribute to a culture of carelessness (or care), and3) to devise, from the analysis, strategies that address individual and social suffering. This

1 The national security industry comprises private security and intelligence gathering companies, as well asancillary private companies that provide logistical and other services for the U.S. military and otherintelligence agencies and companies (e.g., Kellogg, Brown, and Root, or KBR). The state or government isdistinct from this industry, but I hyphenate state and national security industry because they are inextricablyyoked together. In other words, they are interdependent, feeding off each other. Just as Eisenhower’smilitary-industrial complex cannot be separated from the state, so too the national security industry cannot beseen or understood as separate from both the military and the state.

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latter feature often falls under the heading of justice, but it would include providing variousstrategies of care (e.g., food for the hungry, housing for the homeless and poor, health care forthe uninsured, and education programs that teach empathy and compassion (Goleman 2003). Apastoral-psychological analysis differs from social, political, and economic analyses in that itsobjective is to understand how these larger systems and forces inhibit or foster cultures andcommunities of care. Thus, the focus is less on understanding, for instance, political power oreconomic structures and their relation to the production of wealth than on how political powerand economic systems inhibit or contribute to care of individuals (citizens and non-citizens),families, communities, and the larger society.

The obsession with national security and its consequences

There is plasticity to the concept of national security, both in its definition and use. Nationalrefers to the nation or country, which comprises a) a specific sovereign territory, b) thecitizens who reside within a particular geographic boundary, and c) the state or politicalgovernment and agencies that promulgate and enforce laws and regulations that ordereconomic, political, and social realities. The concept of security, in general, refers tosurvival, safety or freedom from danger. As Chilton noted, the idea of security “is apowerful, and powerfully constraining concept because it is connected by metaphor tomany other concepts and experiences that are of vital importance to humans in variouscommunities and cultures” (1996, p.74). As discussed below, this powerful constrainingmetaphor of security became more clearly connected to the idea of nation after WWII. Ingeneral, national security is defined as the protection and survival of the nation-state and itscitizens through diplomacy, as well as the employment of political, economic, and militarypower.

In his thorough scholarly study, Chilton wrote that “Political discourse, at least since thetime of Hobbes, has created a tight bonding of the concepts of the state, sovereignty andsecurity” (1996, p.421). He noted further that the concept of security, “had been used in theearly political discourse of the United States....But ‘national security’ was an uncommonphrase until the 1940’s” (1996, p.131). During the 1940s, the increasing use of the termnational security centered mainly on identifying real and imagined threats to the survival ofthe United States. To explain this increase, Chilton argued that two events served to solidifythe concept of national security in the minds of the public, namely, the surprise attack onPearl Harbor and the “central implication of modern weaponry: no state can be aninvulnerable, impermeable sanctuary in the age of the strategic bomber and weapons ofmass destruction” (1996, p.131). Of course, the idea of a devastating weapon, such as anatomic weapon, was already present in the American psyche long before 1945. Even beforeWWI, Franklin noted that “atomic weapons played an important role in American future-war fiction” (1988, p.131). While strictly fictional in the early 1900s, the growingpossibility of the power of atomic weapons haunted at least some Americans. ConsiderGlover’s comment, written in 1932 “The first promise of the atomic age is that it can makesome of our nightmares come true. The capacity so painfully acquired by normal man todistinguish between sleep, hallucination, delusion and the objective reality of wakened lifehas for the first time in history been seriously weakened” (Segal 1987, p.139). What couldonly be imagined before WWII became a terrifying reality for people who watched orexperienced the devastation of Hiroshima and Nagasaki.

After WWII, the increased use of “national security” occurred primarily in relation to theSoviet Union. The Soviet Union’s development of nuclear weapons and the means to

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deliver these warheads over long distances provided a “clear and present” danger to thesurvival of the U.S. Of course, to Russian leaders, the United States’ possession of nuclearweapons was a threat to their survival. The Soviet anxiety about national security wasunderstandable given their experience of two devastating European wars and a violation oftheir sovereignty by the U.S. and British forces in 1920 (Northern Russian Campaign). Thissaid, the concept of national security was—for many opportunistic political leaders—awonderfully malleable concept, easily applied to other national and international contexts.The Cuban Missile Crisis, U.S. military direct and indirect interventions in Central Americaand elsewhere (e.g., Dominican Republic, Haiti, Panama, Honduras, El Salvador, Greece,Vietnam, Cambodia, Laos; Boggs 2010; Johnson 1999), the removal or attemptedassassination of government leaders (e.g., Guatemala, Greece, Iran, Cuba, and Chile;Kinzer 2006), and the manipulation of other nations’ economies (e.g., Chile, Brazil; Klein2007) are just some of the actions taken under the umbrella of national security and theconcomitant fight against Socialism and Communism.

What is crucial to point out here is that the concept of national security had tendrilsthat extended far beyond our national borders. After WWII, the extension of nationalsecurity to address situations well outside U.S. geographical borders naturallyaccompanied the broadening of U.S. economic and military power throughout theworld. The rise of the U.S as a superpower or empire meant that the concept ofnational security grew to include any identifiable political, economic, and militaryinterest outside U.S. territorial boundaries (Bacevich 2002, 2005; Johnson 2004). Toseek and maintain both hegemony and security, U.S. government officials came to believethat any threat—real or imagined—to U.S. interests abroad fell under the heading ofnational security. So, for instance, the success of the Sandinista Liberation Front inNicaragua during the 1980s was considered a national security threat, which gave somegovernment officials the license to train Nicaraguan government troops and providemilitary assistance (Johnson 1999, pp.27–28). There are many additional illustrations ofU.S. military and economic interventions in the affairs of other sovereign nations, all inthe name of national security (Boggs 2010; Kinzer 2006).

Since 9/11, the ideas of national security and the war on terror are deeply embedded inthe minds of most Americans. President Bush and administration officials, with remarkableconsistency and coordination, coined terms such as the axis of evil (North Korea, Iran, andIraq), preventive war, the war on terror, and the smoking gun of a mushroom cloud tochannel and harness the anxiety and fear of the American public toward supporting twowars, torture, the Guantanamo prison, secret prisons abroad, and the Patriot Act. What isinteresting and deeply problematic about the proliferation of the term “war on terror” is theabsence of a defined enemy to be defeated, which gives rise to a perpetual war (Bacevich2010; Chomsky 2010; Vidal 2002). Where before the Soviet Union provided a clearcircumscribed enemy, now any person, group, or country can fall under the amorphousbanner of terrorist. Terrorism and terrorists are terms that provide an unprecedentedemotional plasticity in political discourse. Indeed, terrorists are the best kind of enemy ifone is seeking to keep the idea of national security alive and malleable in the psyche of theAmerican public.

The idea of national security and attending metaphors have served to motivate leadersand citizens alike to support massive military and intelligence spending, as well as anaggressive foreign policy that has had very concrete and frequently devastatingconsequences, along with accidental beneficial results. Following WWII the result of theemployment of the phrase “national security” led to an incredible expansion of governmententities, ushering in the “age of the National Security State” (Bacevich 2010, p.35).



Concern for national security, in other words, led to a number of government agencies andmilitary branches that focused primarily on combating the prevalence of external andinternal threats and, in particular, Communist threats. Allen Dulles of the new spyorganization, CIA, Air Force general Curtis Lemay at the Strategic Air Command (SAC), J.Edgar Hoover of the FBI, Robert McNamara the Secretary of Defense, GeneralWestmoreland and many other leaders all played various roles in heightening anxietyabout the threat of Communism to the survival not only of the U.S. but Westerndemocracies as well. Clearly, the Soviet Union was involved in making nuclear warheadsand delivery systems, but, as Bacevich (2010, 2011) noted, many of the claims made byU.S. political, military, and intelligence leaders were greatly exaggerated, oftendeliberately, to pursue personal, national (e.g., economic and political expansion andcontrol), agency (e.g., more funding), and military goals.

A consequence of the emergence of the National Security State was the rise of whatPresident Eisenhower called the military-industrial complex. In his Farewell Address,Eisenhower said,

Our military organization today bears little relation to that known by any of mypredecessors in peacetime, or indeed by the fighting men of World War II or Korea.Until the latest of our world conflicts, the United States had no armaments industry.American makers of plowshares could, with time and as required, make swords aswell. But now we can no longer risk emergency improvisation of national defense;we have been compelled to create a permanent armaments industry of vastproportions. Added to this, three and a half million men and women are directlyengaged in the defense establishment. We annually spend on military security morethan the net income of all United States corporations. In the councils of government,we must guard against the acquisition of unwarranted influence, whether sought orunsought, by the military-industrial complex.2

Certainly, Eisenhower did not use the term “complex” as a double entendre. Themilitary-industrial complex is complex because of the deep and entangling ties between themilitary, corporations, and the state. It is also a complex in the sense of the social psychesupporting these entanglements. That is, the psychological complex was the growingobsession with national security.

Despite Eisenhower’s warning, the military-industrial complex has mushroomed, withan impressive surge after 9/11. The growth of the military-industrial complex was broaderthan simply arming the U.S. U.S. companies played and play a leading role in themanufacture and sale of weapons throughout the world that are sometimes used by U.S.supported dictators (e.g., Somoza in Nicaragua; Rhee in South Korea; Armas and Fuentesin Guatemala) or used by allies to suppress or remove native groups (e.g., Israel occupationof Palestinian lands; Iraq during the Iraq-Iran war). What is important to grasp here is thatthe rise of the national security state and the military-industrial complex, which signified amarriage of the state to private, non-democratic economic institutions, occurred largely byconsistently employing the idea and the seemingly ineluctable logic of national security toheighten anxiety and fear among U.S citizens. Heightened fear and anxiety motivated (andcontinues to motivate) citizens to support massive military spending and aggressive foreignpolicy goals and actions.

Another more recent consequence of the obsession over national security is the rise ofpara-military and security companies used by the government to prosecute the wars in

2 http://mcadams.posc.mu.edu/ike.htm accessed 22 December 2010.



http://mcadams.posc.mu.edu/ike.htm

Afghanistan and Iraq (Johnson 2010, pp.93–108). These private firms, like Blackwater(now Xe services), are also accompanied by corporations that provide all kinds of logisticalsupport for private security firms and the U.S. military (e.g., KBR). The result is that thenational security state is now wedded to both the military-industrial complex and nationalsecurity industries.

The proliferation of the military-industrial complex and national security industries hashad innumerable and harmful consequences for U.S. citizens and people from other nations(Vidal 1986). The U.S. defense budget for 2010 is around $ 600 billion. This is a massiveyearly expenditure, especially given the current economic malaise, and yet this figure omitsthe budgets for the CIA, NSA, FBI counterterrorism, and foreign military aid. Moreover, itdoes not include expenditures to private security firms. It is very difficult to estimate withany accuracy the amount of money spent every year for national security, but it is safe tosay that it reaches near a trillion dollars. Presumably, this spending will decrease whenAfghanistan and Iraq become more stable or we simply leave. Nevertheless, if we return tospending levels of the 1990s, we would still have yearly budgets around $500 billion—stilla huge number. This profligate spending is a symptom of our obsession with nationalsecurity and is accompanied by numerous indirect and direct consequences, consequencesthat President Eisenhower recognized and warned about 50 years ago (Bacevich 2011).

In terms of the indirect consequences of this spending, we have less money to help theapproximately 50 million Americans who do not have medical insurance. Similarly, there isa lack of funds for crumbling urban infrastructures. Funds are lacking for housing and otherservices for the poor. Funding for the arts, school music and art programs, drug and alcoholrehabilitation programs, and programs to educate and assist released felons take a rear seatto military and intelligence spending. Politicians—recently the newly installed RepublicanCongress—have proposed cutting $60 billion from government services, while the militarywill remain free of these cuts (National Public Radio 2011). Of course, the budget cutsaffect U.S. citizens, usually those on the lower rungs of the socio-economic ladder (Marris1996). Citizens of other countries have also received less U.S. aid, unless that country hassome strategic military and economic importance. In that case, one sees an overabundanceof military versus economic aid.3 Indeed, many Americans believe we are a profoundlygenerous nation when it comes to foreign aid, yet the “0.2% of U.S. gross national productrepresented by foreign aid obligations the past two years…is among the smallest amountsin the last half-century. The United States is the largest international economic aid donor indollar terms but is the smallest contributor among the major donor governments whencalculated as a percent of gross national income” (Tarnoff 2004). A result of profligatemilitary and intelligence spending is that people of other countries can expect to receiveless economic aid from the richest nation in the world, unless their country is of strategicimportance to the U.S.

There are other consequences for people who live outside the U.S. The direct andindirect use of military force has led to the deaths of tens of thousands of people, evenwhile other people derive benefits from U.S. presence (Boggs 2010). For instance, U.S.intervention in Vietnam led to the deaths of over 50,000 U.S. soldiers and between 1million and 2 million Vietnamese people (Zinn 1998). The U.S. and allied embargo of Iraq(enforced primarily by the U.S. military) during the 1990s resulted in the deaths ofapproximately 500,000 Iraqi children. The British medical journal, Lancet estimated therewere between 426,000 and 793,000 Iraqi deaths since the U.S. invasion of Iraq in 2003(Fisher 2009).This number excludes those wounded, which is usually three times the

3 http://www.vaughns-1-pagers.com/politics/us-foreign-aid.htm accessed 20 December 2010.



http://www.vaughns-1-pagers.com/politics/us-foreign-aid.htm

number of deaths. There have also been deaths and much suffering that has indirectlyresulted from U.S. interference and/or support for dictators (e.g., Nicaragua, Chile,Columbia, Egypt, Guatemala, Panama, Greece, South Korea, to name only a few). Forinstance, U.S. trained soldiers were involved in terrorism and massacres of their owncitizens in countries like Guatemala, El Salvador, Honduras, and Columbia (Boggs 2010;Kaplan 2002).

The wake of devastation does not mean that the U.S. has contributed only to rack andruin. One may point out the economic success of South Korea and its fledgling democracy.Of course, in this instance, we should not forget the decades of non-democratic rule and theoppression of South Korean people by an authoritarian government the U.S. supportedmilitarily. The U.S. has provided economic and military assistance to the Philippines, againwhile supporting for decades a corrupt dictatorship. In Afghanistan, the U.S. has beeninstrumental in elevating the status of women in political and economic spheres. While thisis to be lauded, it was not the reason for attacking Afghanistan. After the IndonesianTsunami in 2006, the U.S. used the military to provide foreign aid to victims. While thereare beneficial results of some U.S. interventions, there are also considerable costs to thosewho are the targets of U.S. aggression. Ancillary harm also results when massive amountsof money are directed toward national security and away from foreign and domestic health,education, and economic programs.

In sum, after WWII, political and military leaders employed the phrase “nationalsecurity” with greater frequency. Real and imagined threats, both within and outside ourgeographical borders, became linked to the notion of national security. Narrativesassociated with the idea of national security provided an ineluctable logic of perennialperil, heightening the anxiety and fear of most U.S. citizens and motivating them to supportor ignore not only numerous military and clandestine operations in other nations (Boggs2010; Chomsky 2005; Johnson 1999, 2006) but also policies and actions that involvedeconomic control of foreign markets (Klein 2007). Moreover, while the consequences ofthis obsession are, at times, ambiguous, there has been and continues to be significant harmto individuals, communities, and cultures who either fall under the heading of “threat” orare denied resources to improve their lives.

Our obsession with national security: a psychoanalytic perspective

Surveying the global social landscape, Richard Hofstader (1963) concluded that while aparanoid style of thinking and relating exists in many societies, it is particularly evident inAmerican politics. “In the paranoid style,” Hofstadter wrote, “the feeling of persecution iscentral, and it is indeed systematized in grandiose theories of conspiracy” (p.4). He goes onto note a key difference between the clinical paranoiac and the paranoid politicalspokesperson, “both tend to be overheated, over-suspicious, over-aggressive, grandiose,and apocalyptic in expression.” The clinical paranoiac “sees the hostile andconspiratorial world in which he feels himself to be living as directed specificallyagainst him; whereas the spokesman of the paranoid style finds it directed against anation, a culture, a way of life whose fate affects not himself alone but millions of others.His sense that his political passions are unselfish and patriotic, in fact, goes far tointensify his feelings of righteousness and his moral indignation” (p.4). In my view, thefrequent, perhaps opportunistic, use of the idea of national security by political andmilitary leaders and the media’s tendency to serve as an echo chamber fostered whatHofstadter called our paranoid style of politics, which continues to dominate American



psyches and ways of organizing experience. We need only cast a glance back at the recentmid-term elections to hear the apocalyptic and self-righteous predictions communicatedby both parties if the other side won. I argue that the frequent use of and discourse aroundnational security heightens anxiety, signifying the presence of a paranoid-schizoid modeof organizing experience—a mode of experience that accompanies an attenuation of thereflective function and is maintained by shared psychological defenses—namely,rationalization, moralization, denial, splitting, and projection. Like Hofstadter, I am notsuggesting that this is a clinical or necessarily a pathological phenomenon. Rather, I amarguing that the preoccupation with national security signifies a disposition to organizesubjective and intersubjective experience in the paranoid-schizoid mode—a mode oforganizing experience that impedes the capacities for accountability and empathicrecognition of the suffering of Others.

Ogden, building on the work of Melanie Klein (1949a,b), posited three modes oforganizing experience: autistic-contiguous, paranoid-schizoid, and depressive. Black notedthat, unlike Klein, Ogden “does not regard the paranoid/schizoid position as simply aregressed and primitive mental state; rather, he sees it as a mode of organizing experienceoperating in constructive balance with the depressive” (2003, p.634). Put another way,while these modes emerge first in infancy, they are present in complex and dynamic waysin adults’ organizations of experience. For example, listening to the opera, walking througha parking lot, chatting with friends, and engaging in public discourse are illustrations of thedynamic interaction of all three modes. On occasion, one mode may be prevalent. Forinstance, when Janet walks to her car after an evening at the opera downtown, she has aheightened state of awareness. There have been several robberies and rapes lately, and sheis understandably on-guard. This heightened anxiety and awareness may be said to signalthe presence of a paranoid-schizoid (P-S) mode of organizing experience. The anxietyplaces this mode in ascendancy, while the other two modes are in abeyance.

Briefly, the paranoid-schizoid mode refers to the “management of danger” whereby theendangering and the endangered are separated (Ogden 1986, p.44). Keylor similarly notedthat the “paranoid-schizoid position, with its preponderance of projective and introjectiveprocesses, remains an internal perspective that the mind can utilize whenever the viabilityof good self or other is endangered” (2003, p.219). The psychological defense of splittingoperates to manage real and imagined dangers (Ogden 1986, p.46). Accompanying splittingis projection, which is understood as “an effort to remove an internal danger by locating thedanger outside oneself” (p.45). The dangerous object is feared, despised, or hated, while theinternal object is loved and admired. The internal object also corresponds to an attachment.That is, splitting in the paranoid-schizoid position is also an attempt to maintain anattachment with an important, idealized figure, which could be an internal representationand/or an external object (Fairbairn 1952). This splitting of good and bad, ideal anddenigrated “in the paranoid/schizoid mode allows us the psychically invigorating possibilityto embrace more fully pure idealization and pure hatred, temporarily sensing our superiorityand triumph” (Black 2003, p.634).

Ogden (1986) goes on to note that the “inability to diminish one’s reliance upon splittingreflects excessive anxiety about the dangers involved in the interpenetration of differentfeeling states, particularly love and hate. Splitting processes, fueled by anxiety of this type,become rigid and unchanging” (p.57). Put another way, the paranoid-schizoid mode oforganizing experience allows adults “to hate safely, by establishing discontinuity betweenloved and feared aspects of self and object” (p.65). This continuity is rigidly preserved,which provides a sense of psychic security at the cost of a diminishment of a reflectivecapacity or reflective function. The reflective function, Fonagy and Target explained,



“involves a self-reflective and an interpersonal component that ideally provides theindividual with a well-developed capacity to distinguish inner from outer reality, pretendfrom ‘real’ modes of functioning, and intra-personal mental and emotional processes frominterpersonal communication” (1997, p.25). The reflective function entails the ability todistinguish between perception and interpretation. The anxiety and rigidity manifestedwhen the paranoid-schizoid mode of organizing experience is present means that thereflective function is attenuated. That is, in the paranoid-schizoid mode, perception andinterpretation are identical, which means inner reality is indistinguishable from outerreality—the imperiled self and the absolutely real external danger. Put differently, theperception of the Other as enemy is an unquestioned interpretation, indicating a sharpnarrowing of the creative, reflective ability to consider alternatives, be empathic, andtake accountability for one’s contribution to the suffering of “enemies” and of thosewho are victims of “collateral damage.”

The ascendance of this mode and the diminishment of the reflective function can furtherbe understood in terms of the collapse of the symbolic equation (Freud 1924; Klein 1930),which means there is a “non-differentiation between the thing symbolized and the symbol”(Segal 1957, p.393). Put differently, there “is no sense that one attributes meaning to one’sperception: events are what they are, and interpretation and perception are treated asidentical processes” (Ogden 1986, p.61). High anxiety, which may not be conscious, is thesource of this collapse and the concomitant rigidity in thinking—a rigidity manifested in thebelief that one’s interpretation is the perception, which, in turn, is the reality. This collapsemay be momentary, context driven, and/or pervasive, depending on the level of anxiety andthe number of feared objects.

There are, then, four key features of the paranoid-schizoid position or mode oforganizing subjective and intersubjective experience. First, it functions to separate thedangerous object from the endangered idealized subject, providing the individual or groupwith a sense of security in loving and hating; that is, loving and hating are split. Second, thesplitting of the dangerous object from the endangered subject also results in the preservationof the idealized object, which is an internal representation of an external object. Otherdefenses, such as rationalization, moralization, and denial, may be used to buttress thissplitting. Third, in many cases, the split between idealization and hatred in the P-S modeaccompanies experiences of superiority and triumph. Finally, perception and interpretationare indistinguishable, which indicates the attenuation of the reflective function and,correspondingly, the eclipse of empathy and accountability vis-à-vis the dangerous object.

These four features frequently attend discourses where the phrase “national security” isbandied about with ardor. Consider the discourse during the Cold War, where politicalleaders from John Kennedy to Ronald Reagan viewed the Soviet Union as an implacableenemy or evil empire and the U.S. as benign, a shining city on the hill. Kennedy, speakingto the nation about the Soviet’s sending missiles to Cuba, said,

For many years both the Soviet Union and the United States, recognizing this fact,have deployed strategic nuclear weapons with great care, never upsetting theprecarious status quo which insured that these weapons would not be used in theabsence of some vital challenge. Our own strategic missiles have never beentransferred to the territory of any other nation under a cloak of secrecy and deception;and our history—unlike that of the Soviets since the end of World War II—demonstrates that we have no desire to dominate or conquer any other nation orimpose our system upon its people. Nevertheless, American citizens have becomeadjusted to living daily on the Bull's-eye of Soviet missiles located inside the



U.S.S.R. or in submarines....Our policy has been one of patience and restraint, asbefits a peaceful and powerful nation, which leads a worldwide alliance. We havebeen determined not to be diverted from our central concerns by mere irritants andfanatics.4

Overlooking the obvious deceptions and ahistorical pronouncements in this speech, whatis apparent is that this “clear and present danger” is met by an idealized, benevolent, if notinnocent, peaceful nation. A couple of decades later President Reagan urged Americans “tospeak out against those who would place the United States in a position of military andmoral inferiority [and] to ignore the facts of history and the aggressive impulses of an evilempire” (American Rhetoric 2010). Later, Reagan, in his farewell speech, said, “We meantto change a nation, and instead, we changed a world. Democracy, the profoundly good, isalso the profoundly productive. But in my mind it was a tall, proud city built on rocksstronger than oceans, windswept, God-blessed, and teeming with people of all kinds livingin harmony and peace; a city with free ports that hummed with commerce and creativity.”5

Both Kennedy’s and Reagan’s speeches represent notable themes extant in U.S. politicaldiscourse vis-à-vis the Soviet Union. The common tropes, which have their roots in thefounding of the U.S., are exceptionalism and triumphalism (see Bacevich 2005; Liu andHanauer 2007). In their political discourse, this exceptionalism is juxtaposed with an evilempire, an implacable enemy seeking to undermine U.S. democracy and the democracies ofother nations. This type of political discourse enables citizens to hate safely the evil empire—a dire and looming national security threat—while happily and unquestioningly lovingthe U.S. The presence of heightened patriotism and the persistent belief in U.S.exceptionalism are evidence of the desire of many Americans to love the U.S. withouthaving to entertain any interpretation that would call this idealized object into question(LaMothe 2009; Moïsi 2010). While loving the U.S., citizens can, at the same time, safelyhate the ominous threat to national security.

Speeches of this type, which were common during the Cold War, also illustrate the rigidjoining of interpretation and perception. Thus, we perceive the Soviets to be a threat and weunquestioningly interpret anything coming from them as a threat, leaving no or very littleroom for alternative interpretations or perceptions of either the maligned Soviets or theidealized Americans. This collapse of the symbolic equation or diminishment of thereflective function is supported by splitting, keeping the endangered object from thedangerous object, as well as by other defenses such as rationalization, moralization, anddenial. Consider, for instance, Kennedy’s claim that the U.S. has “no desire to dominate orconquer any other nation or impose our system upon its people.” Any cursory reading ofU.S. history would reveal the obvious fallacy of this claim. Indeed, this interpretationrepresents a glaring denial of U.S. expansionist history and the harm this has causedmillions of people. This denial serves to maintain the idealized representations of the U.S.Rationalization is present in Kennedy’s claim that “Our policy has been one of patience andrestraint.” U.S. policies toward the Soviet Union were generally quite provocative, which isone reason the Soviet Union attempted to place missiles in Cuba (Boggs 2010). In otherwords, the U.S. military occupation in Europe, positioning missiles in Turkey, the invasionof Soviet airspace, and proliferation of nuclear weapons were clearly not evidence ofrestraint and patience.

4 http://www.census.gov/compendia/statab/cats/foreign_commerce_aid/foreign_aid.html accessed 19 April 2009.5 This speech is readily available on numerous websites.



http://www.census.gov/compendia/statab/cats/foreign_commerce_aid/foreign_aid.html

Kennedy’s claim, which involves denial and moralization, or what Fairbairn (1952)called the “moral defense against bad objects,” functions to maintain the split between thegood and bad object. Kennedy asserted that in the interests of national security and theprotection of democracy in the U.S. and Europe, the U.S. must stand up against Sovietaggression and, at the same time, deny or rationalize destructive consequences of U.S.policies and actions. This moral duty also served to motivate Americans’ righteousindignation toward the enemy, while preserving the beloved, innocent object. Moralization,rationalization, and denial impede the capacities for accountability and empathy of thosegripped by the obsession with national security and the paranoid-schizoid mode oforganizing experience.

With the fall of the “evil empire,” one might have happily anticipated that the paranoid-schizoid mode of organizing experience in American life would have receded into thebackground. Such was not the case. Aleksandr Yakovlev, a confidant of President MikhailGorbachev, recognized the challenge that would result when the Soviet Union dissolved.He said, not without some irony, “We are going to do something terrible to you; we aregoing to disappear as a threat” (Moïsi 2010, p.119). With the arrival of a “new world order”and the unquestioned supremacy and hegemony of U.S. economic and military power, therecame a challenge of deciding who to fear and hate. In the midst of this change, it is veryclear that political discourse and narratives of idealization and grandiosity continuedunabated. In other words, the collapse of the evil empire did nothing to alter the grandiosityand idealization of the U.S. by many citizens. Indeed, the fall of the Soviet Union was metwith a great deal of self-satisfaction, if not triumphalism (Fukuyama 1992), at havingdefeated the evil empire, seemingly proving again U.S. exceptionalism. For instance,President Bill Clinton viewed the end of the Cold War as “the fullness of time” and the U.S.as an “indispensable nation” in helping the world toward democracy, peace, and economicprosperity (Bacevich 2002). More recently, George W. Bush (2008), in his State of theUnion speech, remarked, “By trusting the people, our Founders wagered that a great andnoble nation could be built on the liberty that resides in the hearts of all men and women.By trusting the people, succeeding generations transformed our fragile young democracyinto the most powerful nation on Earth and a beacon of hope for millions.” A few yearsearlier Max Boot lauded the U.S. supremacy, writing, “We are an attractive empire....Afghanistan and other troubled lands today cry out for the sort of enlightened foreignadministration once provided by self-confident Englishmen in jodhpurs and pith helmets”(Johnson 2004, p.70). Instead of emphasizing U.S military greatness, political speechwriterEric Liu boasts of the greatness and exceptionalism of the American Constitution (Liu andHanauer 2007). In short, the loss of the Soviet Union only confirmed the familiar tropes ofexceptionalism and triumphalism—tropes that are features in the paranoid-schizoid mode oforganizing experience (Black 2003, p.634).

The fall of the Soviet Union did not mean that we did not have any enemies, but therewas no single enemy to grab our collective attention. The term “national security”continued to be in use and the paranoia-schizoid mode of organizing experience continuedto be present, though it became more obvious after 9/11 when we constructed an enemyworthy of the defeated Communists. Instead of a worldwide conspiracy of Communists, wenow face a global threat from jihadists who aim to harm or destroy the U.S. Terms such asIslamo-fascists were used to garner hatred toward Muslim extremists who were deemed tobe a national security threat—a clear and present danger to U.S. national security. Muslimextremists were characterized as amoral, evil, demonic, outlaws. U.S. leaders moralized andrationalized the invasion of two countries, secret prisons, extraordinary renditions, torture,and also the wounding and killing of civilians. When rationalization and moralization



failed, leaders like George Bush, Dick Cheney, and Condaleeza Rice switched to denial.For instance, there was a constant refrain—in the face of overwhelming evidence to thecontrary—“The U.S. does not torture.”

The attacks of 9/11 brought forward a new enemy, but little changed, except the kind ofenemy we engaged. The rhetoric of national security simply shifted objects of fear andanxiety. In my view, this discourse around national security signifies the presence ofsubjective and intersubjective paranoid-schizoid modes of organizing experience. Theaccompanying loss of the reflective function and the desire to love the U.S. and safely hatethe enemy are apparent in the unwillingness to view the “enemy” as anything other thanenemy, which, in turn, means that we deny, rationalize, and moralize the harm done tothem. Moreover, the loss of the reflective function results in overlooking the negativedomestic and foreign consequences of massive government spending in building up andmaintenance of the military-industrial complex and the national security-state industry.

Obsession with national security: a theological perspective

While psychological and theological concepts represent different language games, theynevertheless have areas of overlap. For instance, our collective obsession with nationalsecurity signifies the prevalence of the P-S mode of organizing experience, and this modecan be further depicted as an idolatrous relation rooted in deep and pervasive anxiety andthe unconscious desire for invulnerability. Idolatry and its twin, bad faith, are theologicalconcepts that I use to explicate the dynamics that result in a preoccupation with the care ofoneself and the loss of the care for the Other.

Idolatry, for Niebuhr (1941), is the totalitarian tendency in human affairs, which entailsthe illusion that we not only possess the truth, but all the truth there is. In a similar way,Tillich (1951) viewed this tendency as the process of elevating what is relative andcontingent to an absolute. All forms of this totalitarian tendency are tyrannical since theyresist any knowledge or experience that might threaten the illusion that one possesses all ofthe truth. To account for this tyrannical and obsessive purchase on Truth, Farley (1990)argued that human beings often respond to existential vulnerability and its accompanyinganxiety by absolutizing the relative and contingent. That is, in an effort to “transforminescapable vulnerability into something contingent and manageable,” human beings“refuse the structure and situation of their finitude” by absolutizing the relative andcontingent (p.132). This avoidance of existential vulnerability is secured by the unassailablebelief (illusion—mistaken belief) that we possess all the truth there is.

This totalitarian tendency represents an obsessive and rigid grip on the absolutizedobject, precisely because of the amount of anxiety and fear that lurks beneath. Putanother way, the idolatrous object is obsessively held because it provides the illusion ofsecurity, while also distracting people from existential vulnerability and anxiety. Theloss of the object is unthinkable, because it would expose the horror of vulnerability.Worshipping the golden calf comes to mind as an example of collective idolatry. God,who is infinite and eternal, is replaced by an object that is neither. In other words, deepanxiety fuels the action of raising a relative and contingent object to ultimate concern,to use Tillich’s (1957) term. This provides people with a false sense of security—falsebecause it avoids facing the existential reality of our vulnerability. To maintain theillusions of certainty and righteousness, considerable psychic energy is expended to holdonto the idolized object, lest individuals face directly the anxiety and insecurity theydesperately seek to avoid.



Naturally, people who are caught in the grips of idolatry fail to see either theirrelationship or their actions as idolatrous. While I would argue that this, too, represents aloss of the reflective function, it also indicates a distortion of the will, which is supported byrationalization and denial that screen fear and anxiety. Put differently, idolatry involves theuse of core narratives to spell-out our engagement in the world such that aspects ofexperience (e.g., anxiety) and behavior (e.g., forms of interhuman alienation) aredisavowed, resulting in the subversion of our moral capacity (Fingarette 1969). Thissubversion of the moral capacity is the tyrannical and obsessive spelling-out of our Truthand the concomitant denial of the experiences and truths of Others, which results in the lossof empathy toward those who are deemed to be a threat and those who fall outside nationalsecurity concerns.

Idolatrous relations also signify the presence of bad faith or a totalizing faith (Lifton1979). Niebuhr understood the dynamics of faith to involve three interrelated dialectalpairs, namely, belief-disbelief, trust-distrust, and loyalty-disloyalty. For Niebuhr, thedistortion of faith was evident in the collapse of this dialectical tension in favor of onepole or the other. For instance, near absolute belief, trust and loyalty vis-à-vis anotherhuman being or object signify the presence of idolatry, while near absolute disbelief,distrust, and disloyalty signify the presence of despair. The totalizing or bad faith of idolatryinvolves an absolute belief, trust, and loyalty to the object while disbelieving anddistrusting any person or thing that threatens to question this absolute or total relation. ThisOther who questions is also totalized as an enemy, and this accompanies various forms ofbehavior leading to interhuman alienation—violence, exploitation, rejection, and subjuga-tion of people who do not accept the Truth. In bad faith, we have no obligation to the Otherwe deem to be inferior, except when the Other is defeated or cowed.

The obsession with national security is a manifestation of idolatry and bad faith. In termsof idolatry, political and other leaders have fanned the flames of collective anxiety under therubric of national security. This anxiety, which is transformed into fear of the enemy,strengthens the grip on our belief in the absolute necessity of protecting our nationalsecurity into an indefinite future. Put differently, our fear of and aggression toward theenemy involves a projection of our existential vulnerability and associated anxiety onto theenemy. This anxiety is also attended by a belief in U.S. exceptionalism—the U.S. is aunique nation, the most powerful nation on earth, and certainly blessed by God. Forinstance, we are a city on a hill, a beacon of democracy to the world, chosen by God. Thisexceptionalism is deeply entwined with the dogma of national security. Our exceptionalismand the idea of national security work together in providing the logic to intervene militarily,politically, and economically in the affairs of other nations. The logic of exceptionalism andthe dogma of national security point to an idolatrous relation between citizens and theirnotion of the U.S. This idolatrous relation is evident in the overlooking of the transientreality of the U.S. as a nation. All empires fall and no nation is chosen by God to save.

The vast and inordinate amount of energy and resources poured into national security isanother indication of the totalitarian tendency. Our national budget may be said to reflectour priorities, but in actuality reveal our anxieties, insecurities, and obsessive hold on thedogma of national security. Well over one trillion dollars has been spent fighting two wars.As indicated above, we spend hundreds of billions of dollars every year on military“defense” and the alphabet soup of intelligence agencies. Idols are costly because we mustcontinually feed the illusions lest existential vulnerability make its appearance. Putdifferently, our profligate spending on national security points to our ultimate concern—national security and the preservation of U.S. exceptionalism. Finally, the idolatrous featureof national security is confirmed by the absence of public voices questioning this article of



faith and its harmful consequences; citizens who do are relegated to media Siberia ordeemed to be out of touch with realpolitik. It is indeed unthinkable for those clinging to theidol of national security to entertain doubt about their adoration of the U.S. To do so wouldawaken deep anxiety associated with existential vulnerability, ambiguity, and uncertaintythat are screened by the myths of invulnerability and exceptionalism. We would have toface the fact of the precarious and inevitable transience of all nations and their citizens.Instead, we cling more tightly to this unquestionable god—a god, like the gods of old, thatis ravenous and demanding of huge sacrifices of blood and treasure—ours and others.

The bad faith manifested by our absolutizing national security is seen in super-patriotswho idealize the U.S., believing in its sacred exceptionalism, trusting in its eschatologicalrole in history, and offering unquestioned loyalty to its survival. Citizens who raisequestions about U.S. exceptionalism and the U.S.’s absolute right do whatever it takes toinsure our national security are often labeled as un-American, at best, and traitors, at worse.Bumper stickers such as “American, Love it or Leave it” signify this bad faith, whereloyalty and trust are given only to those who adopt the creed of national security. The badfaith associated with the idol of national security is also apparent either in the cruelindifference or lack of empathy vis-à-vis the destructive consequences of U.S. actions tosecure our place in the world (Boggs 2010). Consider, for instance, Madeline Albright’sresponse to a reporter. The reporter asked about the embargo on Iraq and the fact that anestimated 300,000 to 500,000 Iraqi children had died as a result. He asked: Was the price oftheir deaths worth it? Albright responded affirmatively (Zinn 1998). Her indifference,which is typical of citizens caught in the grip of idolatry and bad faith, reveals the absencenot only of empathy, but also the absence of any fidelity toward Iraqi children oraccountability for harm caused by U.S. policies. Bad faith, then, is apparent in thecollective denial and rationalization of destructive actions, military and economic, towardother peoples. It is also evidenced by the lack of citizens’ knowledge about oraccountability for the millions of deaths resulting from military and economic actionsdirected toward nations who are and were deemed to be national security threats. Bad faithis seen in the absence of national atonement, accountability, and reparations for thedevastating and illegal destruction of lives and land in Laos, Cambodia, Vietnam, NorthKorea, Japan, Panama, and Nicaragua. Bad faith is present in the refusal to acknowledgethe economic devastation resulting from U.S. interference in Chile, Haiti, Argentina, andBrazil. The idol of national security casts a dark shadow of bad faith, leaving in thepenumbra all those who are harmed by our efforts to preserve national security—an ideathat extends well beyond preserving territorial integrity.

Conclusion

The notion of national security seems to be an unquestioned and unquestionable featureof American political life, especially since WWII. While I believe that the desire fornational security is not inherently problematic, I have argued that it is whenever itrefers to interests that extend far beyond geographical integrity—national securitycoupled with imperialism—and is obsessively and ruthlessly pursued. I have sought toprovide two interpretive frameworks to understand the dynamics of national security asit relates to collective psyche and U.S. actions toward peoples who are constructed asthreats. The resulting consequences of this paranoid-schizoid mode of organizingexperience and totalitarian tendency are a notable lack of care for and indifferencetoward anyone who is labeled a national security threat.



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