The Iraqi war and our morality: discussion
The most significant moral issue of our time, arguably, is the morality of the war we are supporting with blood and money in Iraq.
We have no defense against suicide bombers, as the Israelis have discovered. How long shall we offer our youth to this war now redefined as giving the Iraqis "democracy?"
We had a debate yesterday (December 18) in our Social Ethics class, Midway College, about the morality of the Iraqi war. We argued for and against a position paper that proposed: 1) our morality was no better than the 911 WTC bombers; 2) it is our country that over 50 years has created and fueled Muslim extremism; and 3) since we have no regard there for civilian casualities, we are no better morally than the 911 bombers. ( I will later post this position paper on this website.)
It was an interesting debate. No one there dealt with the fact that it is the USA that has through secrecy and empire, control, dominance and military power, created the radical Muslim response to this country, starting at least with Iran and installing the Shah as our puppet some fifty years ago. (This was the basic point that Dr. Samhat made in his talk on November 16 at the University of Kentucky library, sponsored by the Notre Dame Club and the Christian - Muslim dialogue group, "What Americans Need to Know")
The students could not do this even after hearing the Muslim speakers in Lexington.
We are simply not well informed enough as citizens to realize and accept that our imperialist policies have caused by hook or crook thousands of deaths overseas and the installing of dictators, leaders and governments known to be friendly to us, and willing to suppress any dissent among their own people, over many decades. We do not have that context, so most of us are willing to believe whatever our own leaders tell us.
How do we get our news today, when many do not even read the daily paper? When most of our lives are filled with other responsibilities? Our plates seem so full.
No one in the class dealt with the argument that our killing of probably one hundred thousand civilians could not be justified morally or legally. That our disregard for civilian life in Iraq is a war crime in itself. The fact that we are refusing a body count means only that the number of deaths is unimportant for the achievement of our goals of "freeing the Iraqi people."
The main arguments given for the war seemed to be three. 1) Saddam Hussein was a cruel dictator who did very cruel things to his own people; and 2) We must go after the cowards who did this--the USA cannot let "them" get away with what "they" did; and 3) We have the obligation to defend ourselves and cannot stand by and allow others to attack us so secretly, so cruelly, while using our own technology to do so, e.g., flying our own airplanes loaded with innocent Americans into the WTC towers, the Pentagon and the Pennsylvania field.
Now, in attempting to encourage dialogue among friends, relatives and now students for many months, I believe it is the shock of that 911 event that still colors the attitudes of most Americans toward this war. I remember clearly writing on the internet, several web sites, on the need to understand why Muslims want to attack us in that way, the roots of Muslim rage.
My point is that we need to know who the enemy is, and why they are the enemy, that is, what motivates them and why--if we are to be successful in coping with this dire danger to our security both now and in the future. I was accused at the time of lacking patriotism, of being a liberal softie. Our enemy must be so completely evil that only a forceful military response is useful. "They hate our freedoms," is the refrain of Mr. Bush.
I beg to differ. That is simply not true. It also ignores the fact that we have invaded their Muslim world long ago on the sly, created our own dictatorships in their countries, support the Saudi dictators as friends, and most of all, have given unqualified support, weapons and money to the Israelis, and not supported the just and moral cause of the Palestinians, who were expelled from the territory, homes, businesses, places of worship which they had occupied for centuries.
For anyone who understood the Middle East at all, its history with the West, the tribal nature of its societies, the current impossible quagmire in Iraq was totally predictable.
And that is still only part of the complex issue. We put terrorist weapons in the hands of Saddam Hussein, poison gas in fact, in his fight against the Iranians, which he later used on the Kurds. We put terrorist weapons, munitions of every type then available, in the hands of Osama Bin Laden when he was a tribal leader against the Russians in their invasion of Aghanistan. As long as they were on our side we armed them and taught them how to fight effectively.
The shock, anger and fear generated by 911 is still so much with us that we cannot see that the Iraqis were NOT responsible for 911 in any way. Not only were they not part of the conspiracy, but they did not have weapons of mass destruction. We cannot see that our war against them is simply not justified. It is illegal and immoral.
We have no right to invade another country simply because they have a cruel dictator. There are many dictators in the world. When they are our friends and support our needs and aims, such as the Saudis, or in Latin America, then we overlook their injustices. Or if the future markets there are so great for American corporations, we pay no attention to the suppression and killing of millions of people as in China under Mao. We have supported dictatorships in Latin America and ignored the killing of their own suspected civilians for decades. We have embraced any and all governments, military and otherwise, who would resist the emerging national spirit of the common folk that they are being abused and used by the rich and powerful of their own country.
We, the United States of America, have, in fact, been the rogue bully of the world for many decades. But we will not learn of this through the main media, which will seldom speak out against the powers that be. Most of prefer not to look, not to be informed. Our plates are too full. Therefore we are too ready to believe the lies our leaders manufacture to keep themselves in power.
Many other issues here. Can we easily afford a war that turns the world against us, which most of the world, and particularly the Muslim world, regards as unjust? Which will cost over 100 billion dollars when we do have not have health care for 40 million of our own? Which will cost and is costing thousands of lives, including the best and bravest of our youth? When the Muslim world numbers 1.4 billion today, how many future terrorists are our policies manufacturing, even if only one out of 1,000 or one out of 10,000 becomes a future terrorist?
My point is that our unjust, illegal and immoral war in Iraq is creating many future terrorists and suicide bombers throughout the world that future generations of our children will be forced to live with. Osama bin Laden could not have designed such a better scenario than to generate an ongoing conflict between these two cultures, the West and the Muslim world, a clash between two cultures. He knows he will win this war as we are playing into his hands. There is no defense possible anywhere against suicide bombers.
My last point is that until we understand the Muslim culture and our own history in that region, that is, the real reasons, for the suicidal rage against us, we cannot be effect in responding to it. We are making the situation worse by every new abuse of human rights, which is widely publicized in the Muslim world.
What we discovered this fall in Lexington is that surprisingly few of our citizens are willing to take the time and energy to discover "What we need to know as Americans," and "What we need to know as Christians" about Muslims and the Middle East.
There is grave reason for concern for the future of our nation, our children and our world.
Question: What is the one single and simple mandate that Jesus gave us, the only MANDATE? Answer "To love our neighbor as ourselves."
If our neighbor is defined by Jesus as anyone in need (His answer to "Who is my neighbor?" was the parable of the Good Samaritan), then we have 1.4 billion Muslims in the world, most of whom feel misunderstood and misjudged by the United States of America, hurt and angry that we have, in their view, wrongly invaded a Muslim country that did nothing to us.
That so few are willing to do this pilgrimage of understanding today makes "our situation" precarious, yet filled with precious opportunity.
Discussion, anyone?
(Note: Paschal has served in or with all four branches of the U.S. Military, both enlisted and commissioned, active and reserved, with letters of commendation or their equivalent from each branch: Army, Air Force, Navy and Marines, during two wars and peacetime. He had two different commissions in the US Navy Reserve, one as Chaplain and another as Psychologist in the Medical Corps Reserve, and served in duty ranging from Japan and Guam across the USA to Rhode Island.)
We have no defense against suicide bombers, as the Israelis have discovered. How long shall we offer our youth to this war now redefined as giving the Iraqis "democracy?"
We had a debate yesterday (December 18) in our Social Ethics class, Midway College, about the morality of the Iraqi war. We argued for and against a position paper that proposed: 1) our morality was no better than the 911 WTC bombers; 2) it is our country that over 50 years has created and fueled Muslim extremism; and 3) since we have no regard there for civilian casualities, we are no better morally than the 911 bombers. ( I will later post this position paper on this website.)
It was an interesting debate. No one there dealt with the fact that it is the USA that has through secrecy and empire, control, dominance and military power, created the radical Muslim response to this country, starting at least with Iran and installing the Shah as our puppet some fifty years ago. (This was the basic point that Dr. Samhat made in his talk on November 16 at the University of Kentucky library, sponsored by the Notre Dame Club and the Christian - Muslim dialogue group, "What Americans Need to Know")
The students could not do this even after hearing the Muslim speakers in Lexington.
We are simply not well informed enough as citizens to realize and accept that our imperialist policies have caused by hook or crook thousands of deaths overseas and the installing of dictators, leaders and governments known to be friendly to us, and willing to suppress any dissent among their own people, over many decades. We do not have that context, so most of us are willing to believe whatever our own leaders tell us.
How do we get our news today, when many do not even read the daily paper? When most of our lives are filled with other responsibilities? Our plates seem so full.
No one in the class dealt with the argument that our killing of probably one hundred thousand civilians could not be justified morally or legally. That our disregard for civilian life in Iraq is a war crime in itself. The fact that we are refusing a body count means only that the number of deaths is unimportant for the achievement of our goals of "freeing the Iraqi people."
The main arguments given for the war seemed to be three. 1) Saddam Hussein was a cruel dictator who did very cruel things to his own people; and 2) We must go after the cowards who did this--the USA cannot let "them" get away with what "they" did; and 3) We have the obligation to defend ourselves and cannot stand by and allow others to attack us so secretly, so cruelly, while using our own technology to do so, e.g., flying our own airplanes loaded with innocent Americans into the WTC towers, the Pentagon and the Pennsylvania field.
Now, in attempting to encourage dialogue among friends, relatives and now students for many months, I believe it is the shock of that 911 event that still colors the attitudes of most Americans toward this war. I remember clearly writing on the internet, several web sites, on the need to understand why Muslims want to attack us in that way, the roots of Muslim rage.
My point is that we need to know who the enemy is, and why they are the enemy, that is, what motivates them and why--if we are to be successful in coping with this dire danger to our security both now and in the future. I was accused at the time of lacking patriotism, of being a liberal softie. Our enemy must be so completely evil that only a forceful military response is useful. "They hate our freedoms," is the refrain of Mr. Bush.
I beg to differ. That is simply not true. It also ignores the fact that we have invaded their Muslim world long ago on the sly, created our own dictatorships in their countries, support the Saudi dictators as friends, and most of all, have given unqualified support, weapons and money to the Israelis, and not supported the just and moral cause of the Palestinians, who were expelled from the territory, homes, businesses, places of worship which they had occupied for centuries.
For anyone who understood the Middle East at all, its history with the West, the tribal nature of its societies, the current impossible quagmire in Iraq was totally predictable.
And that is still only part of the complex issue. We put terrorist weapons in the hands of Saddam Hussein, poison gas in fact, in his fight against the Iranians, which he later used on the Kurds. We put terrorist weapons, munitions of every type then available, in the hands of Osama Bin Laden when he was a tribal leader against the Russians in their invasion of Aghanistan. As long as they were on our side we armed them and taught them how to fight effectively.
The shock, anger and fear generated by 911 is still so much with us that we cannot see that the Iraqis were NOT responsible for 911 in any way. Not only were they not part of the conspiracy, but they did not have weapons of mass destruction. We cannot see that our war against them is simply not justified. It is illegal and immoral.
We have no right to invade another country simply because they have a cruel dictator. There are many dictators in the world. When they are our friends and support our needs and aims, such as the Saudis, or in Latin America, then we overlook their injustices. Or if the future markets there are so great for American corporations, we pay no attention to the suppression and killing of millions of people as in China under Mao. We have supported dictatorships in Latin America and ignored the killing of their own suspected civilians for decades. We have embraced any and all governments, military and otherwise, who would resist the emerging national spirit of the common folk that they are being abused and used by the rich and powerful of their own country.
We, the United States of America, have, in fact, been the rogue bully of the world for many decades. But we will not learn of this through the main media, which will seldom speak out against the powers that be. Most of prefer not to look, not to be informed. Our plates are too full. Therefore we are too ready to believe the lies our leaders manufacture to keep themselves in power.
Many other issues here. Can we easily afford a war that turns the world against us, which most of the world, and particularly the Muslim world, regards as unjust? Which will cost over 100 billion dollars when we do have not have health care for 40 million of our own? Which will cost and is costing thousands of lives, including the best and bravest of our youth? When the Muslim world numbers 1.4 billion today, how many future terrorists are our policies manufacturing, even if only one out of 1,000 or one out of 10,000 becomes a future terrorist?
My point is that our unjust, illegal and immoral war in Iraq is creating many future terrorists and suicide bombers throughout the world that future generations of our children will be forced to live with. Osama bin Laden could not have designed such a better scenario than to generate an ongoing conflict between these two cultures, the West and the Muslim world, a clash between two cultures. He knows he will win this war as we are playing into his hands. There is no defense possible anywhere against suicide bombers.
My last point is that until we understand the Muslim culture and our own history in that region, that is, the real reasons, for the suicidal rage against us, we cannot be effect in responding to it. We are making the situation worse by every new abuse of human rights, which is widely publicized in the Muslim world.
What we discovered this fall in Lexington is that surprisingly few of our citizens are willing to take the time and energy to discover "What we need to know as Americans," and "What we need to know as Christians" about Muslims and the Middle East.
There is grave reason for concern for the future of our nation, our children and our world.
Question: What is the one single and simple mandate that Jesus gave us, the only MANDATE? Answer "To love our neighbor as ourselves."
If our neighbor is defined by Jesus as anyone in need (His answer to "Who is my neighbor?" was the parable of the Good Samaritan), then we have 1.4 billion Muslims in the world, most of whom feel misunderstood and misjudged by the United States of America, hurt and angry that we have, in their view, wrongly invaded a Muslim country that did nothing to us.
That so few are willing to do this pilgrimage of understanding today makes "our situation" precarious, yet filled with precious opportunity.
Discussion, anyone?
(Note: Paschal has served in or with all four branches of the U.S. Military, both enlisted and commissioned, active and reserved, with letters of commendation or their equivalent from each branch: Army, Air Force, Navy and Marines, during two wars and peacetime. He had two different commissions in the US Navy Reserve, one as Chaplain and another as Psychologist in the Medical Corps Reserve, and served in duty ranging from Japan and Guam across the USA to Rhode Island.)
posted by Paschal Baute at 8:08 AM
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