Feeding the God of War. (The Right Perspective).(analogy: the perpetual wars of the Aztecs, and of the United States)(Brief Article)

Centuries before the phrase "Wag the Dog" entered the American vocabulary, an earlier American superpower perfected the use of politically convenient phony wars. Through the use of stage-managed, conspiratorial conflicts called "Flower Wars," the Aztecs became the dominant Meso-American military power, assembling an empire of tributary states.

"The Aztecs ... were the chosen people of the sun," writes historian Alfonso Casos in The Aztecs: People of the Sun. "They were charged with the duty of supplying him with food. For that reason war was a form of worship and a necessary activity that led them to establish the Xochiyaoyotl, or 'flower war.' Its purpose, unlike that of wars of conquest, was not to gain new territories nor to exact tribute from conquered peoples, but rather to take prisoners for sacrifice to the sun."

Aztec rulers would approach leaders of other tribes and arrange for wars to be fought in which few warriors would be killed, but thousands of prisoners would be taken. Concealing themselves behind a barricade of flowers, the treacherous leaders would witness the consummation of their betrayal as their armies were taken away to serve as fodder for Aztec altars.

The Flower War was devised by an Aztec warlord-priest named Tlacaelel, who for decades was the power behind the Aztec throne. He was also the chief architect of the Aztec kingdom's foreign policy, in which the Aztecs allied with the city-states of Texcoco and Tlacopan against Tiaxcala, Cholula, and Huexotzinco. One historian notes that following the creation of this grand alliance, "the Aztecs carried out these highly ritualized campaigns against their neighbors, especially the Tlaxcalans. Curiously, they refrained from conquering Tlaxcala because it provided a training ground for young Aztec warriors and a source of sacrificial victims." In short, the entire scheme devised by Tlacaelel was intended to bring about a state of perpetual warfare, with the Aztecs either preparing for war or fighting wars against enemies they would never entirely destroy.

Assuming that our own Power Elite pursues a variation of the Flower War strategy would explain a great many things. For instance: Why was our nation led into no-win wars in Korea, Vietnam, and the Persian Gulf? Why do our rulers persist in creating enemies and then wage inconclusive wars against them? Could it be that our own rulers, like those of the Aztec empire, seek to perpetuate war, rather than resorting to it reluctantly in the cause of national self-defense?

Some might object that while such conduct might be expected of superstitious, primitive ...