The preceding slogans could just about sum up the "death merchants'" views of NATO's war on Serbia. And no wonder...

But even before this request, and well before the shooting war started on Mar. 24, the new Day of Infamy, the U.S. defense budgt for fiscal year 1999 and beyond had been already increased by the Clinton administration. The White House requested in February an additional $112 billion in Pentagon spending over the next five years, bringing the Pentagon's budget up to $319 billion by 200 (see the chart below).

So much for NATO's war on Serbia having been caused supposedly by Slobodan Milosevic's intransigence. Or by the "humanitarian" concerns of the NATO bombers. It is evidently a well planned and funded Washington "Wag the Dog" production.

We've been saying all along that the only winners in this tragic charade are the "death merchants," along with an assortment of other industries which work in support of the NATO war effort. And that the true motto of the New World Order (NWO) is "Perpetual commerce through perpetual war," and NOT its oft-repeated mantra "World peace through world trade."

Well, now the New York Times has seconded this assessment in its today's business front story (May 19)

"...American weapons makers are already anticipating that Kosovo may help secure a strategic victory for them - not on the battlefield, but in Congress. After a decade of slashing armaments spending by nearly 70 percent and downsizing the military contracting industry, Washington now seems inclined to increase outlays for weapons...

For military contractors, the relevant portion of the Pentagon budget is the money earmarked for weapons - as much as $53 billion for weapons procurement next year and $60 billion the following year - compared with $44 billion last year, which was the lowest level in more than a decade."

Most of the transports, weapons and ordnance now in use in Kosovo is equipment no longer actively produced, the Times said. Which includes the C-5 transport plane, the B-2 bomber and the Tomahawk cruise missile. So the need for new generations of materiel, and the money to pay for it, represents the best business opportunity in years for military contractors.

"Kosovo underscores what the industry has been saying - that we need to get to a sustainable rate of spending," Daniel Burnham, chief executive of the Raytheon Co., the No. 3 Pentagon contractor which made the Tomahawk cruise missile, told the Times. "We need to get to $60 billion in weapons outlays. We are now on that path. And we are getting there faster than we first thought."

In other words, Clinton is accelerating his efforts to please the "death merchants" who helped send him to Washington. Compared with the Bush administration, when there were 14 military engagements, with one big one - the Gulf War, the Clinton years have so far been pretty "lean picking" for the nation's defense contractors, despite the nearly four dozen engagements. So now, before his term and the Y2K clock run out, Clinton is delivering another fairly "big one," in Yugoslavia, to the applause of industrial America.

But not just industrial America. A host of other industries benefit from the foreign wars, such as NATO's attack on Serbia.

If you take a look at the list of the top 50 Pentagon contractors in the fiscal year 1998 (see APPENDIX 1 at the end of this report), you will find CBS Corp., for example, as No. 21 with $567 million in Pentagon contracts; Massachusetts Institute of Technology as No. 29 with $372 million; Booz Allen & Hamilton as No. 37 with $312 million; John Hopkins University as No. 38 with $306 million - to mention some non-industrial beneficiaries of Washington's foreign wars.

You will also find on the top 50 list a number of big health care and IT services providers, along with energy companies, and even some foreign multinationals (e.g., Rolls-Royce, Phillip Holzmann Aktiengesellschaft, etc.).

Among the IT services companies, CSC was No. 19 with $647 million in prime Pentagon contracts; Unisys was No. 43 with $281 million, and EDS was No. 46; $261 million.

Altogether, the top 50 Pentagon suppliers received $63 billion in fiscal year 1998 contracts, or 23% of the total defense budget.

Which is over five times Yugoslavia's prewar GDP, generously estimated at about $12 billion. Pentagon's 1999 budget is about 23 times greater than Yugoslavia's GDP; while the U.S. GDP alone, without taking into account the economic muscle of the other 18 NATO countries, is about 741 times greater. The Serbs are also outnumbered by 97-1 by the 780 million citizens of NATO countries.

Yet NATO is losing the war, according to some estimates of independent analysts. Because the Washington and NATO "supermen" had not studied the Serb culture before attacking them. An old Serbian proverb says, "bitku ne bije svijetlo oruzje no srce u junaka" ("battle is not fought by the shiny weapons but by the hearts of heroes").

The "death merchants," on the other hand, don't care about who wins and who loses, as long as there are wars going on somewhere in the world. Because after the destruction comes the rebuilding. First you knock them down, then you build them up. Defense contractors make out either way.

In January 1998, the Economist magazine reported that Bosnia was the No. 1 country in the world in terms of its GDP growth. Albania was second. We suspect most Annex Research clients may be shocked to find that out?

Yet, it's all perfectly logical. Both countries had just been through civil wars Bosnia for 3½ years; Albania for a few months. And they were in the process of rebuilding, with the help of $5 to $10 billion of western taxpayers' money.

Which is why NATOs "death merchants," individually and collectively, must have cheered another New York Times front page news story (May 19). The Yugoslav Army has started to dig and fortify the possible approaches which NATO ground troops may use in an eventual land assault on Kosovo, the Times said.

In other words, far from being ready to give up, as the NATO spokespeople keep repeating their own wishful thinking, the Serbs are getting ready for a long and bloody war. And now, a U.S. Air Force general has conceded the same thing.

Asked by the Times how long the air war might continue, Gen. John Jumper, the head of the U.S. Air Force in Europe, gave a terse response "Months."

Most normal human beings would have shuddered at such a thought. But not the Pentagon and other NATO defense contractors. Can't you hear them chanting, "War is great. Peace sucks. Long live NATO?" We can... As we can see Wall Street jumping for joy at Gen. Jumper's proclamation.

So stand by for another "good day at the office" for the CCCC-killers (Clinton, Clark, Cohen, Chirac). And for America's "death merchants" and their bosom-buddies in other industries. Or for a "good month"... Or a year... God forbid!

George Orwell would be having a blast. The NATO version of the Big Brother has outdone even the grim predictions about the global tyranny, outlined in his masterpiece "1984." Which is understandable. There was no TV back in 1948, when he wrote the book.

Oh, yes... Let's now forget the non-Y2K compliant ordnance. Much better for the Pentagon and "death merchants" to use it up than have to spend money on upgrading it. And deadlier. For the victims killed or maimed by them.

Isn't war a great business? Especially considering the bottomless money pit used for funding it - the taxpayers' bank accounts. Beats having to sell for a living. Especially if someone else does the killing. As NATO is now doing it for the "death merchants" P&Ls and balance sheets.