Is War the Enemy?

One of my friends was recently having a discussion with me about the Iraq War. In this discussion I talked about the terrible situation in which the rise of Islamo-Fascism threatens the entire world. But my friend wanted to insist that Islamo-Fascism is merely an illusion and a matter for law enforcement rather than a matter for military action or diplomacy on a massive scale. Instead, he’s very worried about the American military and its power. He said, “To my way of thinking, war is the enemy.”

War is the enemy? I didn’t say much at the time but it occurred to me that this is something like saying “surgery is the enemy.” After all, tens of thousands of people around the world die in surgery every year. Even when successful, surgery causes immense pain and suffering. Surgery frequently has lasting unpleasant side effects. But would we all be better off without surgery? No, because there is something worse. Surgery is how we fight certain kinds of disease. War is really the same sort of thing. If we decided that when any resolute and armed group of people desire to loot, rape and pillage some other part of the world, we would merely let them do whatever they wanted to their heart’s content, there would be no wars. But there would be something worse. There are actually some things worse than war. While there are some wars in which groups mutually bent on pillage fight it out between each other, and while it is also true that civilizations are never perfect or holy, it is often the case that wars occur between one armed group bent on pillaging and enslaving another and a group that is resisting being looted and pillaged. America has been involved on behalf of other countries that are the target of looting and enslavement. To come to the aid of others in this situation is extremely biblical. The entire Bible is full of injunctions to aid those that are oppressed. None of this is to say that war is not painful or difficult, but rather to say that in a fallen world, it is a necessary tool.

I don’t think that my friend is alone though. There are many people who somehow believe that war is a sort of force or thing or entity that compels people to desire greater armaments and to waste their time and effort and resources in pursuing marshal pleasures. But I don’t think that is a realistic view of the world. Totalitarian regimes do occasionally stir up a desire for marshal ardor. And in truth, there is nothing wrong with honoring the just warrior—the valiant knight who protects the interests of the poor, the powerless, the oppressed, and the suffering. The happy warrior is deservedly happy, provided he is a warrior for good rather than for ill.

I suspect that my friend’s misconception arises not really from a belief that war is a mysterious force that robs people of their reason, but rather from a belief that human beings are basically good and are somehow manipulated by their environment or the greed of others into making foolish choices. I think he believes that war is always one of those choices which should be deemed foolish. Undoubtedly he probably believes that if we just gave dictators a little bribery money and treated them with the dignity and respect due to their megalomania, they would live happily with their neighbors and not need to be checked by armed forces. Sadly, I do not think this is the way the world really is. While no human being is perfect or sinless or entirely altruistic, the world is full of people who suffer not merely from run-of-the-mill temptations but from desires more contrary to the will of God and the best interests of their neighbors. This has been true since ancient times when the Bible discusses “Nimrod” who translations often describe as a mighty hunter before the Lord but whose context would seem to say that he was a mighty warrior against the Lord (to the degree one can struggle against a sovereign God). Islamo-Fascism is merely the latest in thousands of years of movements dedicated to bad ideas and forcing those bad ideas on as many human beings as possible. The study of these movements needs to be based not upon wishful thinking or upon the propaganda that they provide to the West, but rather upon an examination of their own ideology and literature. There is plenty of that available to the public and plenty of analysis of that ideology and literature is available as well.

My friend would probably think that the pentagon is full of the very sort of “Nimrods” described above. But that is not my experience. Nearly all of the people in the “military industrial complex” that I have met, or known about second hand, or known from their writings, have been very decent virtuous individuals who really did want peace and justice and liberty under the rule of law etc.

My friend is also concerned that war endangers civil rights. There are certainly some domestic dangers in the fight against Islamo-Fascism. I do worry that because Islamo-Fascism is based upon a sort of fundamentalist religion, the struggle against it will result in a backlash against Christians who genuinely believe in the Bible and the truths of Christianity. I also do have concerns about how our constitutional liberties could be usurped in the name of homeland security and secrecy if the focus of the war changes from offense against Islamo-Fascists to a defensive cordon of security around every one of the millions of possible targets in the United States. But I do not believe that either of these risks is worse than the risks of not fighting Islamo-Fascism itself. This is a case in which the cancer requires surgery or it will kill the patient in the long run long before the patient’s life would naturally expire. And this surgery requires not only a war of weapons, but a war of ideas in which truth is brandished as the greatest weapon of all.