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CounterPunch
January
24, 2003
Military Might
Threatens the Planet
When
Wisdom Lags Behind Technopower
by ALWYN MOSS
With passing day, the likelihood of war in the
Gulf region grows despite the efforts of many people, in and
out of the realm of international and national politics, to prevent
another episode of military violence as a purported means of
resolving the problems in Iraq; problems which many people in
the world and in our own nation believe could well be handled
through diplomacy and the ongoing U.N. weapons inspections.
Yet the almost hypnotic pull toward war,
a war that will be dominated by another display of overwhelming
high-tech weaponry, looks to prevail in the coming months.
After 9/11, "everything changed."
That was the prevailing theme of comments made in those terrible
first weeks after the devastating events. Surely, this seemed
as if it was one of the defining moments of human history calling
for significant change. But what actually changed? Or did the
response to 9/11 simply accelerate the slippery slope humanity
has been on since the end of World War II?
The sense of fear we experienced in September
2001 is certainly not diminishing. Almost every new episode of
violence is countered by a response of equal or greater violence.
Yet to lay the cause of today's worldwide insecurity exclusively
at the door of terrorism and "rogue nations" is to
avoid seeing the long-term perspective and threats of our time
and the future.
I refer to the widening gap between the
magnitude of humankind's high-technological capacities in the
realm of weaponry and warfare, as compared to our limited ability
to resolve disputes peacefully. In this dilemma we can, to some
extent, foresee the greatest danger of all for this planet and
its people. Soon after the dropping of the two atomic bombs on
Japanese civilian centers at the end of World War II, Albert
Einstein, whose discoveries went a long way toward making such
weaponry a reality, is quoted as saying: "Everything has
changed - except the way we think."
"If only I had known, I should have
become a watchmaker."
More than 50 years later, we see the
awesome but tragic unfolding of a new phase in human history.
Our unlimited technology advances and the rapid spread of their
use throughout the planet - without a consequent growth of restraint
and wisdom - are leading to an unprecedented imbalance in almost
every sphere affecting human life and the health of the planet.
Unlike earlier periods, our abilities
today to inflict massive destruction on an "enemy"
are limited only by the scope of our imaginations. The U.S. arsenal
of military weaponry, including missile and nuclear technology,
is extraordinary. Yet the patience and wisdom required to seek
and utilize methods alternative to brute violence is in short
supply.
We persist far too often in the belief
that we can control or end opposing ideas we deem evil through
our overwhelming military power rather than dealing with international
conflicts by nonviolent methods. Despite the growing realization
that all beings deserve respect, and that the mass killing of
civilians in war is unacceptable, even when classified as "collateral
damage," it is still possible to win support for intense
military violence if the case for war is presented with sufficient
arguments and "facts" to bolster the image of a fearful
enemy.
There is nothing new in the way governments
and their leaders use simple psychology tactics to bring the
public on board when they believe it is in their interest to
do so. At the Nuremberg trials after the end of World War II,
Hermann Goering, a high-ranking Nazi official in Germany, stated:
"It is always a simple matter to drag the people along,
whether it is a democracy, or a fascist dictatorship, or a parliament,
or a communist dictatorship. Voice or no voice, the people can
always be brought to the bidding of their leaders. That is easy.
All you have to tell them is that they are being attacked and
denounce the peacemakers for lack of patriotism and exposing
the country to danger. It works the same in any country."
There is something very strange and troubling
when the world's foremost military power; the only nation to
possess thousands of nuclear bombs, nuclear weaponry, missiles;
the only nation to have actually used atomic bombs on a civilian
population, demands the total disarmament of a small, devastated
nation under threat of pulverizing that nation into total submission
and regime change.
Incredibly, this threat includes the
possible use of nuclear weapons to deal with the possibility
that the other nation might have some nuclear capability.
We would like to believe that the United
States could be the force of change that might deliver humanity
from its present misery, often as not due to poverty aggravated
by endless wars. Yet it is well known that the United States
leads the world in sales of weapons of every variety. The character
and quality of a nation - even a superpower - can be judged by
its priorities. A look at the figures describing our global military
expenditures tell the story.
The United States will spend $343 billion
this year (and increasing amounts each coming year) for military
expenditures. All our allies combined will spend $205 billion
in 2003, China $42 billion, Russia $60 billion, while all the
so-called rogue states' military budgets will not exceed $14
billion.
It is not difficult to foresee an abyss
into which many centuries of ethical-moral progress may fall.
At a time when the technology of war has succeeded in making
weaponry more lethal, while bestowing an aura of surgical cleanliness
as a way of having modern warfare seem more "acceptable,"
it is essential that we not lose the moral foundations of our
humanity, still striving to affirm the value of all life against
the tremendous odds of a power-dominated planet.
As one of millions of Americans who can
see no legitimate reason for a new war, and who has tried to
speak sanity to our current leadership, I wonder how we shall
endure the anguish of watching the needless massacre of innocent
lives and the devastation of fragile regions of our precious
Earth. How shall those of us who truly believe that violence
only begets more violence, and that the risks of peace are far
less than those of war, walk on and not despair?
Alwyn Moss
lives in Blacksburg, Virginia. She is a writer, art teacher and
member of the Society of Friends. Moss can be reached at: alwyn24060@yahoo.com
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