DOMESTIC CAUSES OF AMERICAN WARS offers a unique and critical take on the causes of major American wars throughout its history. Unlike most histories that designate foreign threats as casus belli, this work examines their important underlying economic triggers, reaching the striking conclusion that many were unnecessary for national security nor were they as heroic in upholding American values as commonly concluded. Further, conventional histories often dwell on the positive outcomes of those wars rather than on their much more important domestic ill effects—the erosion of the American founders’ constitution and of the civil liberties and constitutional checks and balances therein, while enabling the rise of an imperial presidency.

This historical volume addresses those often-buried domestic causes and effects, in particular how the American elections cycle often affects U.S. entry into wars and how economic motives incentivize war. America’s early wars – the 1812 war against Canada, the Mexican war, the wars against Native Americans – all concerned territorial aggrandizement and acquisition of the rich resources therein. The industrial north fought the Civil War to prevent the expansion of the South’s cheaper mode of production based on slavery into the expansive territories acquired during the Mexican War. The Spanish American war marked the U.S. lift off beyond its new domestic borders, in pursuit of domination and exploitation in Latin America and the acquisition of new territories overseas.

The United States entered World War I to save its trade and loans with Britain and France. During World War II, a unique permanent U.S. military-industrial complex arose that lobbied for continued weapons production during peacetime to sustain its fragile local economies. Thus, by exaggerating the Soviet threat, pressures arose for military interventions in Korea and then Vietnam during the Cold War. The threat of terrorism similarly served to keep the war economy afloat during the post-Cold War era by an overly expansive war on terrorism. The prospect of accessing Iraq’s oil incentivized the war in that country. The need for ongoing wars to feed the voracious appetite of the military industrial complex through billions of dollars of arms sales has been an ever-present factor in the wars in Afghanistan and Ukraine.

“Ivan Eland’s “Domestic Causes of American Wars” will not make it onto the bedside tables of America’s politicians, foreign policy gurus, and corporate bosses. That is because he documents their all too often unseemly roles in foisting America’s involvement in our declared and undeclared wars and a multitude of military adventures. The domestic political and self-interested economic origins of these conflicts, starting in the 18th century and running up to today, come with frequently ruinous outcomes, sometimes for the politicians who start them but more often for the whole country. Read it.” WINSLOW WHEELER, key staff member on the Senate Budget Committee

“Ivan Eland’s book is a must read for both students and practitioners of foreign policy. It provides a thorough historical analysis that demonstrates that in the vast majority of cases, the reasons for U.S. military action have less to do with actual threats to national security and are more for domestic political reasons — a reality the foreign policy and defense establishment refuses to acknowledge. Knowing this reality, Eland makes the compelling case that the United States can adopt a more sensible restrained foreign policy and less costly defense posture — to the benefit of national security and economic prosperity. That would be truly America first.” CHARLES PEÑA, Non-Resident Fellow at Defense Priorities and former Director of Defense Policy Studies at the Cato Institute+

“Ivan Eland’s Domestic Causes of American Wars is two excellent books in one. He carefully makes the case that the wars we have been in since the 1780s were unnecessary and were often motivated by domestic considerations. He also documents the ways we have lost our liberties during and after most of these wars. Read and learn.” DAVID R. HENDERSON, Research Fellow, Hoover Institution

“In Ivan Eland’s latest book, he investigates the histories of most of the wars and military operations during the history of the American Republic. He concludes that they were all, to varying degrees, not only unnecessary for national security, but frequently harmful to it, besides often presenting dangerous challenges to the constitutional order, especially to civil liberties. Far from being caused by real threats to the security of the United States, Eland argues that historically America has gone to war largely due to the electoral calculations of politicians and the (real or imagined) economic benefits to businesses. This interesting, bold, and provocative book should be of great interest to historians, political scientists, and all students of the history of American foreign policy.” DR. PETER C. MENTZEL, Senior Fellow, Liberty Fund