Why the state goes to war is not a mystery – at least the general reasons are not mysterious. War is an excuse for spending money on its friends. It can punish enemies that are not going with the program. It intimidates other states tempted to go their own way. It can pave the way for commercial interests linked to the state. The regime that makes and wins a war gets written up in the history books. So the reasons are the same now as in the ancient world: power, money, glory. Why the bourgeoisie back war is another matter. FUll ARTICLE ON LRC
Source link: http://blog.mises.org/3562/the-glory-of-war/
The Glory of War
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Too damned cynical! And infused with hubris. Mr. Rockwell assumes his own infallibility at determining the motives of nearly 400 million people. His short list of motives reveals nothing about why Americans support going to war, but a great deal about his lack of imagination. I learned years ago from a professor at the University of Oklahoma, who taught fiction writing and wrote many novels, that the motives we choose for characters in fiction are limited only by our imagination. For any action, hundreds of plausible motives could be attributed to the actor. The choice of motives is determined by how the author wants readers to perceive the character. If the author wants readers to see the character as stupid, he will attribute stupid motives to the character. If he wants the reader to consider the character evil, he will choose evil motives. Mr. Rockwell plays the role of a fiction author who wants his readers to view the bourgeoisie as naive. He has no insight into the psychology of anyone, not even himself. Let me toss in a religious perspective: The Bible asserts that man doesn’t know his own motives, let alone those of others, because man is bent on self-deception as much as he is on deceiving others. Only God knows the human heart. For Mr. Rockwell to claim that virtue for himself makes him a blasphemer!
I think you might be getting the wrong end of the stick here. The focus seems to be on a specific sector of the middle classes who are like senseless cheerleaders. Rockwell is exploring the issue of why they are like this.
Simply saying that he has no right to say anything about motivations is not very helpful, and it backfires on you, because you are also a human who has no knowledge of motives, which means you can’t say anything about Rockwell’s motivations. It kind of makes your whole comment meaningless, and any possible discussion of history or politics is also made pointless.
No, I think Lew Rockwell (as usual) hit the nail on the head. Of course people’s motivations are varied and diverse, but there are not 400 million reasons the United States went to war.
WE reject war because WE don’t have a complusion to kill people and break things. But every society (nation) has citizens with a compulsion to kill people and break things. The purpose of war is to give them relief in a foreign nation.
Poor Lew, he take from capitalist pig to blasphemer and many other insults. This time he is absolutely correct in analysing the psychology of the mass in case of war i.e. the middle class supporting the powerful and the rich via nationalism, or better say imperialism, downloading the frustrations of everyday life.Well done, Lew, this time.About the guy refering to Bible that known best of human heart I frankly don’t see any sense. Gott mit uns?
“The Bible asserts that man doesn’t know his own motives, let alone those of others, because man is bent on self-deception as much as he is on deceiving others.”
Which is why Rockwell is correct. The Bible states we all have a sin nature. Better that those (whoever they are) who can’t control their sin nature do their acting out in Africa than North America.
Come on guys! Are your imaginations so constrained that you can’t come up with any other motives for going to war? How about these–self-defense, defense of others who can’t defend themselves, prevent a greater crime. Are you telling me that no one in this country can possibly have those motives?
I just remembered an excellent example of people being grossly wrong when trying to determine another person’s motives. After Sadam Hussein invaded Kuwait, US pundits gave dozens of explanations for his motives. Some said he wanted Kuwait’s oil. Others that he needed better access to the Gulf. Some thought he was preparing to invade Saudi Arabia. Others thought that he considered Kuwait as a traditional part of Iraq and wanted to restore that relationship. On and on they went, inventing more and more motives for his assault. But an Iraqi general who was present at the meeting in which Hussein told his generals why he wanted to invade Kuwait recounts how Hussein explained it: He had had a dream in which Allah told him to invade Kuwait and he would succeed. That’s it!
Here’s another one: It’s widely assumed that Japan surrended to the US at the end of WWII because we dropped the second A-bomb. But a PBS documentary on the subject the other night said that the A-bombs had little impact on the generals. They were more afraid of Russia, who had just entered the war against Japan. They surrendered out of fear of the Russians! This comes from their own hands, not the speculations of some intellectual thousands of miles and 60 years distant.
No, eliminating the guesses about motives would not destroy the work of historians. It would improve it greatly!
I had a strange, (or was it surreal) discussion about Iraq a while back. Without any prompting from me, a fellow co-worker offered this assessment of the Iraq War: Washington will
1. Fail to accomplish its goals in Iraq.
2. Spend billions more in the effort.
3. Kill tens of thousands more Iraqis.
4. Kill thousands more American soldiers.
5. Create even greater animosity between US and the world.
6. Continue to create even more chaos and hardship than what already exists there.
7. Eventually exit Iraq with its tail between its legs as it did in Vietnam.
I said to myself: wow, someone who thinks like me, great! So I said to him: “I agree. So it only makes sense that Washington stops its military adventure in Iraq as soon as possible, like today right?” Guess what? He did not agree; Nor did my co-workers who had been nodding along with him as he enumerated the likely results of continuing. One said “Are you serious?”.
We ran out of time and opportunity to pursue this discussion, so I didn’t understand their reasoning. But I guess Lew explains it, “…war works as a kind of narcotic”. Everyone is on drugs!
Well, Paul, looks like we’re the only ones on the blog at this time. You have an interesting take on the war. I heard a lot a people echo the sentiments you enumerated, too. But many of those who expressed them admitted that they expected the Iraq war to follow the Vietnam pattern. I disagreed because I knew that the military had learned a lot and were determined not to repeat Vietnam. However, I think they came very close to repeating it because many politicians haven’t learned those lessons.
Personally, I had mixed feelings. I had opposed the first Gulf war because I am convinced that the royalty of Kuwait and Saudi Arabia are the same kind of murderous thugs as was Hussein and I couldn’t see getting upset that the Kuwaitis had simply switched thugs. Then, after learning of the mass murders of Kuwaitis, I was stunned that Bush 1 let Hussein go free. Then to make things worse, three times on international TV Bush 1 urged the Kurds and Shia to rise up and overthrow Hussein. When they did, Hussein slaughtered them by the hundreds of thousands and Bush 1 would not lend a hand. I have never been so ashamed to be an American. If you add the mass murder of Kuwaitis, the slaughter of Kurds and Shia, our failure to support the uprising, and ten years of Hussein’s troops shooting at our planes daily as they flew over Iraq, his attempt to assassinate the president, and his plot to blow up 10 US airliners over the Pacific, I thought we had every right to invade his country. No we owed it to the Kurds and Shia. I was suspicious of reports that he had nuclear weapons, even though he proclaimed that he had them in his own daily newspapers. I know that my motives for supporting the war are far more complex than Mr. Rockwell will admit, so I can’t help thinking that the motives of others are more complex, too.
I love Austrian economics and read everything I can on it. But Rockwell’s constant trashing of religion and his extreme views on war absolutely guarantee that the great intellectual contributions of Austian economics will never get a wider hearing. It’s a shame that his views on religion and war damage the cause of Austrian economics.
Rockwell constantly trashes religion?
Have you ever read his site?
Pete, I haven’t read all the articles on Rockwell’s site. Maybe I’m guilty of lumping him in with other writers. But the current article appeared anti-religious to me.
You don’t have to read every article on lewrockwell.om to see where Mr. Rockwell’s sentiments lie with regard to religion. You could have just lookd at /today’s/ edition, and noticed the Estabrook article about Benedict XV and XVI, or you could have could have caught on by his closing paraphrase which (I am not a Catholic) is structured the same as part of the confirmation sacrament (I remembered this from seeing it in one of the Godfather movies, since I have never persoanlly witnessed a confirmation ceremony). You can check my facts at http://www.stpeterschurch.uk.com/baptisms/service.htm
(and probably easily find a more authoritative source yourself)
Rockwell says: “Do we reject war and all its works? We do reject them.”
The sacrament uses: “Do you reject the devil and all rebellion against God? I reject them.”
This is really a petty sort of proof, given the plethora of articles on LRC that frame religion (particularly Catholicism) in a positive light.
Maybe I was too quick to judge Mr. Rockwell. If so I apologize. But in the article under discussion I took this line as attacking people of faith:
“Bush did all he could to consolidate decision-making power unto himself, and even strongly suggested that he was acting on God’s orders as Commander in Chief, and his religious constitutionalist supporters went right along with it. They were willing to break as many eggs as necessary to make the war omelet.”
As far as I know, Bush never “suggested” he was acting on God’s orders. He merely said he prayed about it and then did his best to do the right thing. That’s what we all do ever day without claiming to have heard directly from God. Then, after claiming that Bush’s religious supporters were duped, Rockwell asserts that war is a kind of anti-sacrament. He seems to suggest that the religious followers of Bush are at the same time practicing a false religion. He may not have meant it as a slur on religious people, but it follows very quickly after the paragraph about Bush’s religious supporters.
Attacking faith or people of faith, if even, is possible or it’s forbitten by superior order into a contest of political matter in a fairly free way? Mr. Rockwell is a religious man of no doubt and I don’t agree in this because I’m an atheist. But what about the central question of his text about the frustration of the middle class in front of disasters of war that benefit the powerful, the weapons tycoons, the so-called reconstruction corporations at the expenses of the very fearful burgeosy that act in a masochistic fashion? The thesis is, if i’m not wrong, that the american middle class stay silent, pay taxes for support the war machine, covered by the rethoric of patriotism. In one word,american burgeosy have no courage to say no to war, defends their interests and have a conscious of class, exactly middle class, not upper class. This is a core of Mr. Rockwell and the fact that many here dissert around religion is a demonstration that really the faith is the drug of middle people. Sure, may be intellectual elitist in some way, but in my opinion is clear and very corageous. Even more is libertarian in all sense of human existence on this hearth and it’s very dignity.
“The Bible states we all have a sin nature. Better that those (whoever they are) who can’t control their sin nature do their acting out in Africa than North America.”
I’ll agree that North Americans who can’t control their murderous impulses should have access to an outlet in foreign lands on the day when we also agree that those in foreign lands who can’t control their murderous impulses should have access to an outlet in North America.
Seems to me that war can destabilize governments around the world. How is that a bad thing? I thought governments suck….
War also tends to make people dead. One of the reasons governments suck is because of all the people they make dead.
WWII also??
From Virgils unfinished work “The Aeneid” book x.
Meanwhile the palace of supreme Olympus
Has been thrown open: the Father of the gods,
The king of men, has called his council in
As, from the starry place, high over all,
He casts his eyes on the Dardan camp below
And all the latin peoples. The gods sit down
Between the eastern and the western doors
And he begins to speak:’Children of heaven,
Great spirits, wherefore now this change of heart,
And why this contest and this bitterness?
I forbade Italy to take up arms
against the Teucrians. Why this quarrelling,
Which flouts my prohibitions? What is the fear
On one side or the other, which provokes
Recourse to arms and brings out all these swords?
There will be time enough for fighting later,
No need to hurry it, when savage Carthage
Will open up the Alps and send her armies
To bring destruction to the Roman Citadel;
There will be no forbidding contests then,
Or hatred; but this time give assent,
And gladly, to the peace I have determined.’
Jupiter was content with these few words;
But few were not enough for golden Venus,
Who thus replied:
‘O Father, O eternal power that rules
The affairs of men (for what superior
Authority exists for us to turn to?)
You see how the Rutulians are behaving,
How Turnus with his chariot rushes on
Surrounded by them, borne on a tide of war
That runs for him. Already now the Teucrians
Enjoy no more protection from their walls;
Within the gates and on their very ramparts
There is battle, the ditches are full of blood.
Book x, verses 1-35 “The Aenied” By Publius Vergilius Maro composed approximately (30-19 BC)
Correction in typing “The Aeneid” (Not Aenied)
posted by Rolf, (not Rof)
What I have gleamed from Dr. Rockwell’s writings is that he is correct, yet I believe he doesn’t want to associate himself with the side hes really on: conservative, religious, passionate about freedom. These are EXACTLY the OPPOSITE of the traits that the democrats/socialists/liberals hold near and dear. There is nothing wrong, and everything right, with the critisims he holds of Bush, but I think he still wants to be thought of as a democrat or is vieing for thier side. Roger, you have the same intentions as Rockwell, and yes, when we conservative libertairians are harrassed day in and day out by almost everyone in the country, it stings when Lew does it too. His delivery is harsh to those who see the liberals as who they truly are.
Perro, you were on a tyrade against the Catholic church; you’re a suck up.
War as a drug of the middle class? I’m not sure I buy that. How removed is the war in Iraq? Most people are concerned about how to feed thier family and send thier kids to school and now, how to pay for more expensive gas. Most of the conservatives I’ve talked to recognize that war is never 100%, but that there are some positive aspects. Can free trade accomplish more than war? Yes. But it takes a lot longer, and the Iraqi people are better off. Was it worth the billions? How much is human freedom worth? It’s your own value judgement.
The Lost Master
“And when I come to die,” he said,
“Ye shall not lay me out in state,
Nor leave your laurels at my head,
Nor cause your men of speech orate;
No monument your gift shall be,
No column in the Hall of Fame;
But just this line ye grave for me:
‘He played the game’.”
So when his glorious task was done,
It was not of his fame we thought;
It was not of his battles won,
But of the pride with which he fought;
But of his zest, his ringing laugh,
His trenchant scorn of praise or blame:
And so we graved his epitaph,
“He played the game.”
And so we, too, in humbler ways
Went forth to fight the fight anew,
And heeding neither blame nor praise,
We held the course he set us true.
And we, too, find the fighting sweet;
And we, too, fight for fighting’s sake;
And though we go down in defeat,
And though out stormy hearts may break,
We will not do our Master shame:
We’ll play the game, please God,
We’ll play the game.
By Robert Service (1874-1958) English-born Canadian poet. from the book, The Best of Robert Service published 1989
Hei, Dandy, suck-up are you, “cross & sword” super-idiot arguments you propose here just to kill the time that’s frustrating your own life of middle-class american warrior.
“when we also agree that those in foreign lands who can’t control their murderous impulses should have access to an outlet in North America.”
They do – the present Mexican invasion.
The people, enamored of the State, have a short memory span. No sooner is the shiny war of one generation’s politicians forgotten than the politicians of a new generation think up a enticing justification for the next shiny war. Thirty years after the disaster of Vietnam, resorts were being built in Cam Ranh Bay with American capital–all those lost lives stacked on the chattel heap of history because of the arrogance and corruption of politicians! I think the most patriotic thing we can do is follow Hans Hermann Hoppe’s exhortation to take every opportunity to show politicians up for the buffoons they really are. Mr. Rockwell, in all his writings, is doing a yeoman’s share.
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