Michael Sauers

November 2, 2026

For beginners, please read Sapiens by Yuval Noah Harari and The United States of War by David Vine. Harari has a PhD in History from Oxford while Vine is a Professor of Anthropology at American University. As you will learn, both are controversial and have drawn the ire of consensus apologists.

After reading Vine’s work it is difficult to not conclude that in the United States there are corporations, elements of the military and other government agencies, politicians, lobbyists, journalists, think tank analysts, academics and many others who are literally invested in war while also being professionally, psychologically, and socially invested. The people securing most of the benefits of this system have tended to be elites with direct economic interests tied to bases and to the markets and industries directly supported by bases and wars abroad.

Some will respond that the system creates jobs. That it does but at what cost? The U.S. military should not be a jobs program but it is. Spread across all congressional districts are industries directly tied to the military. Many local/regional economic development organizations hold seminars trying to recruit industries into the system.

President Eisenhower explicitly warned the American people about the industrial/military/congressional complex. I believe that JFK was murdered by this theft and cancer. Congress has allocated “trillions” if not more, to the IMC Complex at the expense of universal health care, ending hunger, prioritizing education, free higher education, providing good paying jobs in education, construction/housing, health care, infrastructure and building a sustainable energy system instead of the military. This is just the tip of the iceberg that these people are responsible for.

Why has PEACE essentially vanished as a U.S. policy objective?

Now, on to Sapiens. Harari’s work is a succinct and unvarnished read about our species and the enormous and undeniable path of destruction we have cut through our relatively short time on Earth. From our very beginnings as a species of no significance to our current state of threatened mutual destruction, war on all other species and ecocide he touches on cognitive development, agricultural revolution, taming use of religion, capitalism, war-like tendencies and the life threatening encroachment of science.

After reading, Sapiens, you will understand why the “establishment” community was aghast. This is not the sugar coated stories they like to tell about our “noble” species. It reminds me of the treatment Immanuel Velikovsky got when he published his works, especially, Earth in Upheaval in 1955.

Sapiens can be challenged on several levels but it is an interesting perspective on we, sapiens.

Enjoy!