War Is a Racket is the title of two works, a speech and a booklet, by retired US Marine Corps Major General and two-time Medal of Honor recipient Smedley Darlington Butler. In these works, Butler frankly discusses from his experience as a career military officer how business interests commercially benefit from warfare. After his retirement from the Marine Corps, Gen. Butler made a nationwide tour in the early 1930s giving his speech, “War Is a Racket.” The speech was so well received that he wrote a longer version that was published in 1935, now republished with a foreword by former governor of Minnesota and New York Times bestselling author Jesse Ventura.
