Quite.

[docwebster]

"Truth and trust are the means by which civiliazation holds off barbarism. When those in power intend to abuse that power, they look to an outside enemy in order to trick their people into pressing the means to their own abuse into the hands of the abusers. If an enemy does not exist, it will be manufactured, and all manner of horrors attributed to it, so that anyone who demands truth and accountability is set upon as being unpatriotic."

--Alta by Mercedes Lackey

(snagged from ascendant_moon in bushisms)

Comments

[nsingman.livejournal.com]

True, but verbose. I prefer the more terse "War is the health of the state."