I will go farther than the author and say war and the tools of death and destruction should not only not be profitable, but very costly for defense manufacturers and the multimillionaires, billionaires, and corporations who have insatiable blood and gildlust. Not the taxpayer. These industries should barely turn a profit and be taxed in the 90th percentile.

Everybody should read How to Hide an Empire by Daniel Imerwhar. Its an incredibly well written book that features interesting history about how the US has both built an empire while also masquerading as an anti-imperial nation