[Mb-civic] War Blurs Lines Between Good, Evil

[Reeeees at aol.com]

Published on Friday, November 11, 2005 by the Chicago  Sun Times
War Blurs Lines Between Good,  Evil
by Andrew Greeley
 
They have rededicated the Lady Church (Frauenkirche) in  Dresden. This 
baroque gem from the 1700s was destroyed -- along with much of the  city and 130,000 
lives -- by Royal Air Force bombers in February 1945, two  months before the 
end of the war. This rededication comes as Germans ask whether  they do not 
have the right to mourn their losses during the war -- 600,000  civilians killed 
by the planes of Air Marshal Arthur "Bomber" Harris, also  called "Butcher" 
by his RAF colleagues.
 
I fail to see how anyone can deny them that right,  especially since research 
after the war demonstrated that the mass firebombing  of German cities had no 
impact on the final outcome. The Germans started the  war, it has been 
argued, and therefore they were to blame for what happened to  them. The children 
who were killed in Dresden or in the fire storms in Hamburg  were guilty? Or in 
the American fire raids in Japan?
 
I'm sorry, I can't buy that kind of moral reasoning.  Collective guilt is a 
murky and messy concept, satisfying as rhetoric but  dangerous in practice. The 
same logic would argue that, because Israel took land  from Palestinians, 
suicide bombers are morally justified in indiscriminate  murder of Israeli 
citizens.
 
The raid on Dresden was unconscionable. There were no  military targets there 
worth the destruction of the city. Winston Churchill is  alleged to have 
approved the raid because of pressure from Stalin. He certainly  approved of 
Bomber Harris' systematic obliteration of German cities. Both of  them should have 
been subject to war crime trials at the end of the war, just as  were the 
German leaders. That the latter were far more evil in their deeds does  not excuse 
the former. However, only the victors try the criminals, and they  leave to 
history any judgments about themselves.
 
The lesson of raids on places such as Lubeck and  Dresden is that even in 
just wars, the side that has justice on its side is  likely to do many evil 
things. War sucks everyone and everything into its vortex  of wickedness. The wars 
against Japan and Germany were obviously necessary wars  and yet the victors 
(including the United States) emerged with bloody  hands.
 
Moreover, wars are almost always longer than those who  start them think they 
will be. In 1914, the German general staff predicted  victory in 90 days 
after mobilization. The Confederacy thought that a few  military victories would 
cause the Union to give up the fight.  The British  thought they could restore 
order in the rebellious colonies in a couple of  months. Napoleon and Hitler 
both were confident they could knock over Russia in  a single campaign. 
President Bush celebrated "Mission Accomplished" after a few  weeks. Now the majority 
of Americans believe that he does not tell them the  truth.
 
When good does evil to fight evil, it becomes -- in  T.S. Eliot's words -- 
indistinguishable from the evil it is fighting. War blurs  the lines between 
good and evil so they are hard to recognize and traps those  who launch them in 
Big Muddies of self-destruction.
 
Yet humankind still enters wars with bursts of  patriotism, self-confidence 
and desire for vengeance that blind populations to  the risks they are taking 
and cause leaders to indulge in deception and --  perhaps worse -- 
self-deception about the terrible risks they are taking.  
How could the leadership of this country not realize that an ineffectual war  
in Iraq would, instead of advancing the "war against terror," actually 
generate  new generations of suicide bombers eager for, as the film title says, 
''paradise  now''?
 
How could so many members of Congress and American  voters be so influenced 
by the pseudo-patriotism stirred up in the wake of the  World Trade Center 
attack that they would eagerly and enthusiastically rush into  another Big Muddy? 
Even though "regime change" in Iraq might itself have been a  good cause, why 
were there so many who did not realize the lesson of history  that the war 
would be long and costly and ultimately pointless? And worse still  lead the 
country down the path to torture and murder, which go against all the  nation's 
ideals?
 
Why were there so few who said, "Hey, wait a minute!  What are the risks? How 
long will it last?"
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: http://www.islandlists.com/pipermail/mb-civic/attachments/20051111/ab1269f8/attachment.htm