The last full measure of devotion
The United States has an extraordinary opportunity at this juncture, to set a new example, to model for the world a great military power nation abdicating the use of force and showing the last full measure of devotion to peace.Two quotes have distilled, for me, the argument against war:
Franklin Roosevelt's masterpiece of reassurance: "The only thing we have to fear is fear itself." Being afraid of your adversary is not sufficient justification for attacking him.
And the words of Russell Martin about the shroud placed over a painting at the United Nations last week. As Martin, an expert on Picasso's painting of the Nazis' bombing of the Spanish town of Guernica in 1937, said on National Public Radio:
"The decision to go to war before one's enemies do is the thinking of despots, not statesmen. Sixty-five years after it was created, Picasso's great and powerful painting reminds us of critical truths that the world's nations can ignore only at their peril. The truth is that war is, in fact, hell visited upon the earth. The truth that the decision to go to war in the name of principle, self-interest, policy or even defense is always a very grave one. The truth that free and just peoples are never the first to strike. They are truths that should not be shrouded, truths that news cameras and every one of us around the world must dare to look at directly."Yes, there is good reason for fear. The United States is, indeed, in grave peril at this juncture in history. But it is in far greater peril of acting like Nazis than it is from Saddam Hussein. The Nazis used superior weaponry to demolish a lesser power without justification, in a way that horrified the world. The horror of the world, and the response of terrorists to an attack on Iraq, pose a far greater threat to our long-term interests and national security than Saddam now does.
Absolute power corrupts absolutely, says the maxim. I fear we are seeing it come true in our nation's capital, in the situation room of the world's only remaining superpower.
This page last updated 12/28/05. Contact me
