Questions and Answers Regarding the Nature of War

The following questions are part of a special edition roundtable for the month of August at 411Mania.com/Politics. Normally if I contribute to one of these roundtable discussions I leave my entry as the sole province of 411 content. However, because these were such great and interesting questions that not only spell out beliefs concerning war and peace but also are pertinent to this time in political history, I thought I would post them here on PC as well. So without further ado, here are the roundtable questions an answers I that can also be read on 411Mania.com/Politics:

1). Is the concept of world peace dead? Was it ever alive?

There’s a great book that I read shortly after 9/11 that was intrinsic in changing the way I viewed the world and issue of war as part and parcel of it. That book was “Civilization and Its Enemies,” by Lee Harris. In that book Lee points out in many different ways that as long as human beings compete for resources there will always be war. War is as much a part of human nature and history as breathing and eating. Now while the Scots may have developed the social contract theory as a way of civilizing people and finding a plausible way of sharing resources, the fact of the matter is that sometimes even the promise of evenly shared resources is not enough to placate savage beings. For whatever the reasons are: religion, culture, psychodynamics, etc, some people would prefer to destroy rather than to build. More to the point, it is inherent in human nature to rise to the least common denominator and take the paths of least resistance. Certainly killing and destroying lie directly on the paths of least resistance rather than building and sharing do. For more on that, I suggest you watch infants socialize without the benefit of decent guardian watching.

This answers whether or not peace is possible and until the entire human race is on the same page ethically, culturally, and psychologically, world peace will always be impossible. However, the question was whether or not the concept of world peace is dead and was it ever alive to begin with. You need look no further than the writings of Karl Marx or the teachings of Jesus Christ to know that the CONCEPT of world peace has always been at the very a noble pursuit. Certainly the United Nations collective believe in the theory of world peace as an attainable goal and have stated this in much of their resolutions. Liberals from all walks of life cling to the belief that if they could just drive Israel and all Conservatives/Christians into the sea, then we could all live in a world of subjective moralist and judgment free society. So yes, the concept is alive and well and living the spirit of all of those people who stand in the streets protesting everything from the World Trade Organization to anything that dribbles out of the mouth of George W. Bush. It is a noble and yet naïve belief in the extreme.

2). Is war an unavoidable part of human nature?

As I stated above, war is definitely a part of human nature. It is unavoidable so long as there exists those whom are enemies of civilization (once again see Lee Harris’ “Civilization and Its Enemies”). Now in war there is an inherent definition of the act that assumes we have one group of people attempting to kill another group of people and take their land, resources, et al. Of course you can also war against somebody or something simply because they are perceived to be a threat to your existence. If you look at the history of collectivism, for example Stalinism, here one can see war played as the latter. Stalin systematically tried to eliminate all people, organizations and beliefs that were a threat to Soviet communism as he defined it. This method was copied in Cambodia as well as a whole of other places to various degrees of success. In looking just this definition of war, it is readily apparent that so long as one man perceives another to be a threat to his existence, a competitor is some form or fashion, then there will always be war. When man no longer finds threats of any kind looming in the shadows or actual threats cease to exist then, and only then will war follow into the pyre of extinct human ideas and concepts.

3). Are some wars better, or more just, than others?

I suppose that depends on whom you are asking. Hitler would tell you that due to circumstances resulting from the end of World War I, he was perfectly justified in commencing with the attempted genocide of the Jewish race and occupation of Europe. If the Chinese ever invade Taiwan they will insist that it is there right to do so as Taiwan rightfully belongs to them. If the Chinese ever make good on there threats to invade Japan, they will feel that the Rape of Nanking in World War II absolutely gives them that right to seek a war of revenge. Dick Cheney and Donald Rumsfeld believed they were justified in instituting “regime change” in Iraq because there were responsible for creating the monster that was Saddam Hussein in the first place. They would tell you (in a rare moment of honesty) that they were only cleaning up the mess they had made in the 80’s during the Iran-Iraq war and that furthermore, they were doing the Arab/Muslim world a favor by eliminating a local threat.

Point of view is certainly important but if you really want to nail this down to an objective answer than you must look at my previous two answers. There will always be those that find your existence to be a threat to their society, culture, hold on power, etc. Hell, if you were to follow around a group of adolescent girls they would show you in spades that perceived threats to ones integrity and happiness are in motion all the time. My wife, like most people, always points to examples of other people’s behavior she finds to be a threat to her happiness and if she had her druthers, she’d probably have them shot.

That being said, if you believe in your heart that you are good and have the right to pursue happiness as it is defined in social contract theory, than when that right is violently challenged, you are compelled to defend yourself. This is problem many people don’t seem to understand about the Israeli’s and especially this latest war in Lebanon. Hezbollah and Hamas were not unclear about their intentions; they very plainly wanted to remove the State of Israel from the map of the Middle East. When they had succeeded in doing that, just as soon as they had the means to do so, they would have killed every single Jew in the world as the Judeo religion and culture is perceived by them to be a threat to the existence of the Islamic world and tradition. Israel has been defending its right to exist since it was founded by first the League of Nations and then by the United Nations. Now people like to bitch and moan about how they choose to defend themselves in the face of unending attacks with the intent to commit genocide but that has little or nothing to do with the above question. Any war, including both the wars in Iraq and the last war in Lebanon are just because if they had not been fought, the enemy that resides and schemes in those lands would have eventually had the means to try and eliminate the Israeli’s from the planet and us. In short, war is justified in defense of ones right to exist. Of course by that definition then human civilization would most likely be in a perpetual war of some kind but that’s a column for another day.

4). If you could do one thing to make the world more peaceful, what would it be?

In the above answers I have defined war in terms of those whom are moved by a desire to destroy or whom are easily threatened by competition. Now as a social worker, therapist and a mandated reporter, I can tell you that much of this could be dealt away with if failures of the human condition could be healed forever. If I could do one thing to make the world more peaceful I would eliminate the existence of trauma, anxiety and depression from the realm of human psychodynamics. Take any one person you know who tends to be on the aggressive side and imagine what they would be like if they had never been abused, neglected or mistreated at any time of their life. In other words, I would eliminate mans inherent nature to be beastly to his fellow man in order to satiate his own need. Marx would tell you this could be done through social and economic means and he was proven wrong. Jesus would tell you that this could be accomplished through self-discipline and prayer. Though many try, not enough people have even attempted to follow in Jesus’ footsteps. No, the only way to remove anxiety, trauma and depression from the human condition and thus end war for eternity here on earth would be magic or the hand of God almighty. Since neither magic nor Gods hand are likely to show themselves in this lifetime and perform such a feat, I would suggest that war will be with until then end of human civilization.