From: Steve Peterson (speterson@fast.net)
Date: Mon Feb 10 2003 - 15:13:01 GMT
Sam,
I've been having a hard time forming an opinion about this issue (and about
nonviolence in general), and this last post really struck a chord with me.
I think you hit the nail on the head.
Thanks,
Steve
> Hi Wim,
>
> Thanks for a substantial response. I'm not surprised that your views are
> 'largely in line' with the Quakers - that much I had gleaned already! My own
> views are not simple, and were moving back and forth from one side to
> another for quite a while before reaching their now fairly settled state -
> which means that I am not without sympathy for what you say. Yet I still
> think that aggression against the Hussein regime is justifiable. Now to
> explain why, and precisely what I mean by 'justifiable'.
>
> I don't think I can explain my position properly without giving a little
> background in Christian theology, specifically what is meant by 'the Fall',
> for this is the background against which I am assessing this situation.
> (Atheist readers should look away now; there will be free use of traditional
> Christian language). The Fall, as I'm sure you're aware, is the expulsion
> from Eden as the result of biting the apple. In other words, we're not in
> paradise and we're sinners. This is pretty axiomatic for Christians (if
> there is no Fall, there is no Sin; no Sin, no need for a Saviour; no
> Saviour, no Messiah, no Christ, no Christianity). What this means in
> practice is that we live in an environment which is structured sinfully - we
> are embedded in practices which cause us to sin and there is no way for us
> to avoid sinning. More than this, we need to recognise this sinfulness as
> the first stage in moving away from the situation; put differently, it is
> recognising the light in Christ that allows us to see the darkness for what
> it is.
>
> Now, in a situation like the one we have at present with regard to Iraq, it
> is quite clear what the past patterns of sin are which have caused us to be
> 'mired in sin'. Hussein established himself as a despot on the back of US,
> specifically CIA, support. Indeed, Rumsfield himself went to Iraq in the
> eighties as Reagan's special envoy, to provide - well, we don't know for
> sure, but chances are it wasn't agricultural support. Going further back,
> the UK is wholly complicit in the creation of Iraq as an artificial state. I
> think I am right in saying that the UK were the first nation to gas the
> Kurds (not Churchill's finest hour - I think it was the early twenties).
> More recently, the follow-through to the 1991 war was ill-thought and driven
> by narrow and unenlightened agendas. The West did not want to prolong the
> war and risk further casualties. Consequently we have the sanctions and
> inspection process which a) has not inhibited the Hussein regime, b) causes
> great suffering to the people of Iraq and c) broke down at the end of the
> 90's.
>
> So we are now in a situation where the Hussein regime has been able to
> develop WMD in the face of repeated UN resolutions etc etc. The fundamental
> question is: do we do anything about this?
>
> It seems to me that the principled pacifist position is coherent. This says
> that the use of force is never justified; that there are various creative
> and non-violent ways to change the behaviour of those with whom we disagree;
> and that (as I feel this can only be responsibly held from a religious
> perspective) we must trust in God for the ultimate outcomes. Crucially, this
> perspective rules out *all* uses of force, ie all forms of coercion, and
> therefore - especially in the light of the last decade's experience - the
> whole sanctions regime needs to be discarded. Thinking imaginatively this
> discarding of sanctions would be accompanied by a huge multinational
> investment in Iraq, to rapidly advance the quality of life of the Iraqi
> people, to ensure that there was a change of heart on the part of the
> Hussein regime, so that they saw that it was in their best interests to
> maintain stability etc etc.
>
> As I say, I think this is coherent and also - to a religious person - quite
> a strong argument. Thing is, I can't bring myself to accept it. That might
> be due to a lack of faith on my part. I am fond of Cromwell's dictum: "Trust
> in God... and keep your gunpowder dry." In other words we must trust in
> God - but that does not excuse a lack of prudence on our part, for God also
> works through us, when we let him.
>
> If we follow the logic of the Gandhian position through, then there is no
> point at which we respond to force with force. This would allow all sorts of
> monstrosities to take place if the opposing forces were sufficiently
> motivated. Gandhi said (I paraphrase from memory) that 'it is a matter of
> faith for a satyagrahi that there is no one who is beyond the reach of love'
> (satyagrahi = seeker after truth). I think I do believe that, but I don't
> draw from that the conclusion that the use of force against such a person
> is always wrong (is always a lack of faith). Consider a hypothetical
> example: you are a police officer in the US. There has been a terrorist
> threat received against a children's hospital; you are on guard in a
> particular ward. Two men enter, both with guns. One moves towards you, the
> other starts shooting children. (Obviously I'm delibarately polarising this
> presentation to bring out the underlying issue).
>
> It seems to me that a Gandhian perspective would seek to put your own body
> between that of the person shooting and the children - to try and provoke an
> awareness of love and the right in that person. Yet the second man prevents
> you from doing this. So the shooting goes on. At what point does it become
> right to use force - to draw your own gun and shoot the person killing the
> children?
>
> You might say that this is too hypothetical and unrealistic, so let us
> change to a very real situation: was Todd Beamer right to lead a revolt of
> the hijacked passengers against the terrorists who had siezed control of the
> Philadelphia flight on September 11? I think that he was - indeed I find his
> story to be tremendously moving, and one that reveals a difference between
> the social quality of the typical US citizen and the typical UK or European
> citizen which is shaming to the latter. But that may be an ignorant comment.
>
> To my mind there is a fundamental contradiction between this Gandhian
> position and a traditional Christian one, and the difference lies in the way
> in which the traditional Christian view accepts the inevitability of
> personal sin - indeed, it makes it central and says that it is a dangerous
> illusion to think that you can be free of it.
>
> In the hospital example, to my mind, a Christian policeman would be
> perfectly justifiied in shooting the intruders as soon as there was an
> apparent threat to the children in his care, but - and this is where the
> distinctiveness of the Christian viewpoint becomes apparent -
> _it_is_still_a_sin_to_shoot_the_intruder_. The Christian viewpoint does not
> say that the use of force is righteous - it says that it is a failure, a
> failure provoked by all the previous sins in which all the participants and
> the wider society share. It therefore prevents an ideology being built up
> around the 'rightness' of that individual decision - for such an ideology
> would deny that there was any sin involved. Such ideologies are triumphant
> in the use of violence and ultimately fascist. The use of violence is always
> a failure and a cause for repentance. So there is a difference between
> something being 'justified' and something being inherently good or
> 'righteous'.
>
> So - that's some background thinking. How do I apply this to the present
> context? Well, as I said, I don't think our present framework (sanctions and
> inspections) can continue. The sanctions a) hurt the people of Iraq and b)
> broke down due to their long-drawn out nature, the impact of a) on public
> consciousness, and have not prevented the regime from pursuing WMD. The
> inspections can only work if there is co-operation from the regime. I agree
> with Powell completely on this - you can treble the number of inspectors,
> put in troops, do whatever, but unless there is a commitment from the regime
> to 'come clean' then they will not be able to succeed in their task.
>
> It is still possible to argue, of course, that this process would be better
> than the alternative of going to war. That the risks and suffering attendant
> upon going to war outweigh the risks and suffering attendant upon not going
> to war. To my mind the key question is what would happen *after* the war. If
> the US/UK treat it in the same way as they have Afghanistan - ie don't get
> involved in 'nation building' then I think that the war cannot be justified,
> for there would not be a significant benefit to the people of Iraq, there
> would not be anything to justify the suffering consequent to war. Yet I have
> some room for hope when considering Blair especially, and remembering things
> that he has said in the past (especially his party conference speech in
> October 2001).
>
> Now, there is almost nothing that you and I can do to affect the eventual
> outcome of this situation - we can comment on it, give our views and the
> reasons for our opinions, but largely I think our opinions are just that.
> Moreover, those who are presently entrusted with making the decisions have
> far higher quality information available to them on which to base those
> decisions comapred to us. At this point it becomes a matter of judgement
> and, I would say, of character. The people who are making the decisions are
> (mainly) the leaders of the Western countries - Bush and Blair on the one
> side, Chirac and Schroeder on the other. (Leaving aside the point that
> Hussein could prevent war in an instant, if he backed down and owned up to
> his WMD stocks).
>
> My judgement is that Blair in particular is taking a principled stand, one
> not governed by short-term political calculations but one governed by his
> perception of what is right. I'm hopeful that Bush has a similar
> perspective. Certainly I see those two as having, how shall I put it, a
> certain amount of moral fibre in their characters. Blair is, I think,
> risking everything on this issue - there is a not insignificant chance that
> he will no longer be Prime Minister in six months time, as a direct result
> of the stance he is taking. On the other side I see Chirac and Schroeder
> who - how shall I put this - have not displayed much in the way of moral
> fibre. (I happen to think that their actions of the last few days have made
> war much more likely - they have given Hussein a great boost and
> strengthened his hope and belief in western divisions. I think perhaps in my
> first post there was an element of anger at such politicians for this very
> reason. Contempt is an unChristian emotion, and I'm trying very hard not to
> feel it towards them.)
>
> I don't know how to phrase all this in MoQ terms, beyond what I put in my
> original post. (If we are going to have some form of international order, ie
> a move towards the social, away from the biological, at the international
> level, then we can't allow rogue states to develop WMD, and the authority of
> the UN needs to be enforced.) But that, to my mind, shows how much richer
> the Christian language is, as a guide to clear thinking, and as an aid to
> practical and righteous living.
>
>
> Sam
>
> "Grace. It's the name for a girl. It's also a thought that changed the
> world." (U2)
>
>
>
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