Subscribe to Common Dreams News Updates
Most Popular This Week
Popular content
Today's Top News
The Indoctrination of Missile Launch Officers
The US Air Force has a history of indoctrinating its missile launch officers to assure that these officers will have no moral qualms about following orders to use weapons of mass annihilation. In a PowerPoint presentation used in the training, the Air Force makes absurd arguments for the morality of war and the use of nuclear weapons. It includes numerous quotations from both the Old and New Testaments to make the case for the morality of war. For example, “Jesus Christ is the mighty warrior.” (Revelation 19:11)
The Air Force training acknowledges the devastation caused at Hiroshima and then raises questions for the young officers to contemplate, in seeking to assure that they are not hindered in their assignment to launch nuclear weapons if ordered to do so. Among the questions are those below with my own response to each of them in italics.
- Can you imagine a set of circumstances that would warrant a nuclear launch from the U.S., knowing it would kill thousands of noncombatants?
No, I can’t imagine such a circumstance, and with nuclear weapons, the number of civilians killed could reach far beyond thousands into the millions.
- Can we exercise enough faith in our decision makers, political and military, to follow through with the orders that are given to us?
No, I can’t exercise such faith in our decision makers. I know, for example, that in my lifetime, US leaders have not always been honest and have led us into aggressive and illegal wars on false grounds.
- Can we train physically, emotionally, and spiritually for a job we hope we never have to do?
Why not put our efforts where our hopes and our consciences are instead of training for a job that would cause untold death and suffering?
- To accomplish deterrence, we must have the capability and the will to launch nuclear weapons. Do we have the will now? What about fifty years from now?
Deterrence has many flaws. The capability and the will to launch nuclear weapons are not sufficient to assure that nuclear deterrence will be effective. It requires, for example, rationality and clear communications. The will required is the will to massively slaughter innocent people. Nuclear weapons are immoral instruments and nuclear deterrence is an immoral doctrine that could result in mass annihilation. We profess to have the will to use nuclear weapons now, and I can only respond by continuing to work to assure that we will have moved beyond nuclear weapons and the theory of deterrence long before fifty years have passed.
- Bonus question: Are we morally safer in other career fields, leaving the key turning to someone else?
Bonus answer: We are morally safer working to eliminate all nuclear weapons than to maintain them, assuring that no one has either the capacity or the moral indoctrination to launch these weapons of mass annihilation.
To bolster its argument for the morality of using nuclear weapons, the Air Force training quotes former Nazi rocket scientist Wernher von Braun: “We wanted to see the world spared another conflict such as Germany had just been through, and we felt that only by surrendering such a weapon to people who are guided by the Bible could such an assurance to the world be best secured.” It is a fine touch to turn to a former Nazi scientist for moral standards.
Captain Charles Nicholls, Electronic Warfare Officer of the 328th Bombardment Squadron, is quoted in the PowerPoint as stating: “Each of us in the strategic nuclear deterrence force must establish a moral foundation for our service. Our will to unhesitatingly fulfill our duty will strengthen deterrence, the morally best choice of action to assure peace and freedom.” He calls, in essence, for a moral foundation to unhesitatingly choose the morality of massive nuclear annihilation.
The PowerPoint presentation also includes a quote from General Omar Bradley: “Ours is a world of nuclear giants and ethical infants. We know more about war than we know about peace, more about killing than we know about living. We have grasped the mystery of the atom and rejected the Sermon on the Mount.” The Air Force would do well to reflect upon General Bradley’s statement.
The Air Force seems to have been comfortable with attempting to demonstrate its nuclear prowess in combination with its ethical infancy. It has just announced, however, that it has taken this PowerPoint out of its curriculum “to have a good hard look at it and make sure it reflected views of modern society.” It would be a significant step forward if it were to find that society’s views, long after the end of the Cold War, reflected the morality of a desire to urgently achieve the phased, verifiable, irreversible and transparent elimination of nuclear weapons.
70 Comments so far
Show AllTalk about turning into the enemy—which has always been a projection of ourselves!
The indoctrination has gone much further than the air force. These kids go in after been soaked with propaganda that Christianity is a warrior religion, and Jesus Christ “the mighty warrior” since they were babies. God, the holy war is truly on (and on and on), just as fake as the prior ones.
But I feel sorry for these kids. We’ve failed to hand down to them the logical and ethical tools to discern the pure, insane evil of all this. I swear, the psychologists are more complicit in the violence in this world than the war profiteers, with their damned social engineering. And the megachurches with their obscene ministers. They’ve set the stage for these foolish kids to become mass murderers on a heretofore unimaginable scale, all the while thinking they’re doing the moral and responsible thing.
Nazi rocket scientist Wernher von Braun’s stirring announcement is a startling admission, wrapped in solemn religiosity, that the fascists just changed location.
Don't forget the broadcasters, the press and movie (and now the game) industry for honing the world's minds to violence. I think they're the most dangerous ones of all. Lest not us forget the latest fashion (and long running) American convict/thug motif by the fashion/trend industry... gaudy tatoos, unshaven and unkempt faces, prostitute & generally raggedy look, accompanied with shiny stuff hanging from or stuck into the body. It transcends the entire population. Decades from now they'll probably refer to this time as the Zombie Age. Call it the Violent Look. However you view it, its more than a reflection of our times, its a manufactured thing.
Could material like this, turning Jesus into a warrior, and seeing our nation cannibalize 50% of its budget on the ways of warfare, be any clearer indication that Mars rules? This is not about a deity of life, or a deity of love... it's a worship of the power of destruction. To couch the lust for annihilation, and the dark powers attendant upon it, as the will of God... or a premise in any faint way equated with Jesus, is blasphemy of the highest order. It IS the anti-Christ!
In the spiritual works I've made it my lifetime mission to study, one insight that showed up was that the dark side would use deception as its chief power. What could be more deceptive than that those aligned with the dark side, a moral vacuum that has no understanding of the love that coheres (all of matter, and all of the sentient beings that matter to one another) would take over several of the world's key religions?
By indoctrinating their followers into a religion that twists love into hatred, the preservation of life into its destruction, the fundamentalists invert the very Logos of the heavens.
It is positively Luciferic... the fallen angel finds power by undermining the central tenet of every viable spiritual philosophy, and turning it towards its own deadly ends.
I cannot tire of pointing this out, that archetypes inconsistent with what any morally intact (not brain-washed by authoritarian creeds, neither taught to obey corrupt authority figures) person would see as emblematic of the Godhead, have effectively done to spiritual truth what Monsanto has done to the integrity of nature's seed banks.
We are fortunate that at least some speak out against this M.A.D.ness.
I agree. Mars rules. The feminine as principle, if not person, has perhaps been more sharply reduced than ever, and that’s saying an awful lot. I’ve long looked into the psychology of these upside-down Christian zealots, particularly as they have taken over much of my family and present themselves proudly in my classrooms. It's something I have no definite conclusion to offer. Just mucking around.
The Monsanto analogy is quite good, by the way.
Yesterday there was an article here by Amanda Marcotte, “How Abortion Caused the Debt Crisis.” I didn’t participate in the conversation, but it got me wondering. As I recall of the 60s and 70s, whatever equilibrium, however imperfect and wavering, between the sexes and among the family was quickly dismissed by a media wave of these exciting new ideas, and everyone defending the religious, moral, and cultural grounds of their conventional way of thinking were largely ridiculed. For good or bad, to dash it away so quickly and spectacularly, I suspect, had a much deeper consequence than we ever considered at the time.
Now don’t start calling me right-wing; I’m only being open-minded to something I don’t want to think about but have to. Sense of family is central to a society (except this one, as Linh Dinh recently pointed out, but hasn’t he been saying that we have no sensible center?).
As suffocating as living under the templates of one’s role is, shared archetypes, customs, and even authority have a regularizing effect. The sense that one can walk a path and end up in a somewhat anticipated end-place is important. Our society is most disrupting. My students realize that nothing they do to prepare themselves will likely last for more than a decade or two at most, and that’s a terrible burden. By the time you’re thirty or forty, all your schooling and work will be considered obsolete. You’ll likely have children by then, you’ll nearly certainly have debt—this is not a recipe for social cohesion. It is a recipe for fear, and fear evokes some things, among them a drive to fight back and to try to reach a safe place. But especially to fight back, as viciously as you believe you must.
Thank you, Elizabeth. As you know, I respect your intelligence. You and I do not always see eye to eye, but I would welcome a big commondreams social event, where some of us could REALLY brainstorm over a glass of wine. I would list the persons I sincerely feel this way about, but it might seem unfair, so I'll refrain.
I didn't comment on the Marcotte article, either, because she's speaking as a feminist and so many just don't get it. It would be like a bunch of sports jocks using certain buzzwords that identify plays on the field that are relatively invisible to amateurs or spectators. She was being glib... setting up an interesting chain reaction between the inherent misogynistic controls of right wing conservatives (and their Christian counterparts) and the force that's largely held back the nation in ALL other areas. And I think she's absolutely right. From what I read of the comments, the depth and length of her analogy went right over everyone's heads, and most argued the specifics, poorly, I might add.
Being on deadline (I am fortunate to have maintained several magazine gigs for decades, and these days, I really need the income), and having just finished a book (with annoying techical glitches in uploading the cover art), I literally did not have the mental strength to argue the points I might have made.
Relating to your point about students, there is an important astrological cycle linked to the planet Saturn. I can make an excellent case that links Saturn with the old Testament, and Jupiter with the new Testament. And one of these days I plan to have this info up on You Tube. Here's the point, Saturn takes 29 years to orbit; and we astrologers believe that at the first Saturn return, around age 30, people realize that they are not free at all. By this time many are tethered to debt, in marriages that may not be fulfilling, often responsible for children. It's a turning point or life marker that impacts everyone. Same basic lesson uniquely expressed through each individual life.
At 41-43 is another astrological convergence zone: and the inevitable midlife crisis. Every one of the 4 outer planets at that time will be in a position opposed to, or otherwise setting forth a challenge to (the 90 degree square) its original birth chart location. Many people feel totally disoriented during those years, like they are living in someone else's life.
The next biggie comes at age 56-58 as Saturn's second return.
Knowledge of these influences, built into the RHYTHM STRUCTURES of time, in my view, can save thousands of dollars in therapy. Some of the people I've shared this with have told me that a session with me has, in fact, done more for their understanding than years of therapy. Plus I don't prescribe mind-numbing drugs!
Anyway, thank you for the nod on "Mars rules." As our prez uses his sagacious Ivy League "wisdom" to invest further in a new generation of nuclear weapons, even when the fires came dangerously close to Los Alamos, and even when there are diminished funds in the pot to feed the poor... pretty much reinforces the adage.
We don’t always need to see eye to eye. How boring would that be anyway? And how, really, un-“progressive”? Plus, you don’t have to say you think I’m intelligent. I wouldn’t wrangle or concur with you if I didn’t think the same.
I won't call you right wing.
I will call you an authoritarian wannabe engaging in nostalgia for a golden age that never existed.
"ense of family is central to a society"
Sure. Why is the type of family that you are longing to the ideal / optimal one? Why is the modern family not? Why is the type of family that you long for out of nostalgia better than the modern one?
"As suffocating as living under the templates of one’s role is, shared archetypes, customs, and even authority have a regularizing effect. The sense that one can walk a path and end up in a somewhat anticipated end-place is important."
Indeed. Why do you assume that importance is good? Authority, shared archetypes, one custom which everyone has to follow has a regularising effect, No one disputes this. The dispute is whether this is good.
"Our society is most disrupting. "
Why is this a bad thing?
"My students realize that nothing they do to prepare themselves will likely last for more than a decade or two at most, and that’s a terrible burden."
Why terrible?Why not something to be celebrated? Should education not be a lifelong journey, instead of just a short trip to an end destination, and end destination once you finish school / college?
"By the time you’re thirty or forty, all your schooling and work will be considered obsolete"
Yes. Good. Hallelujah.
"ou’ll likely have children by then, you’ll nearly certainly have debt—this is not a recipe for social cohesion. It is a recipe for fear, and fear evokes some things, among them a drive to fight back and to try to reach a safe place. But especially to fight back, as viciously as you believe you must."
Alternatively, you can see this as an opportunity to continually learn new things, instead of allowing yourself to die mentally and intellectually.
If you think I'm an "authoritarian wannabe," you're quite wrong. I'm asking that we review history and get over our preconceptions. Obviously this makes you quite hot, wherever. And whatever.
Guess what? I am also asking that we review history, and get over some of our nostalgia.
I am also asking that you get over your preconceptions about change, about disruption, about continual education being terrible. I would think that a teacher especially should want people to engage in continual education, instead of allowing themselves to die intellectually and mentally.
Obviously this makes you quite hot, wherever. And whatever.
As a college teacher, I agree with you, although it might well lose me my job in the not so long run when people start to figure it out. Yes, continue to educate yourself. But don't consider it "going to school" where you have to pay people money to learn what you need or want to. Paid teachers are for children, or for people going for licenses and degrees, and if I teach people beyond what should be childhood or their absolute economic necessity, it's to my mixed regret. You don't have to go pay for classes to not "die intellectually and mentally." Are you that stupid? How many hours did the guy who conceived of this thing we're typing on waste on "higher" education?
Your points on my nostalgia and lack of historical understanding are so underdeveloped that there's no answering them. You might get a grip on explaining what you mean before you try to communicate your thoughts to another.
I'm guessing you're an overgrown kid.
"es, continue to educate yourself. But don't consider it "going to school" where you have to pay people money to learn what you need or want to. Paid teachers are for children, or for people going for licenses and degrees, and if I teach people beyond what should be childhood or their absolute economic necessity, it's to my mixed regret."
By that same specious logic, anyone who does not grow their own food, tailor their own clothes, make their own shoes, etc ad infinitum, is an "overgrown" kid
"You don't have to go pay for classes to not "die intellectually and mentally.""
Of course you don't. However, if you consider having to continuously to update your knowledge as a "terrible burden", then yes, you are choosing to die intellectually and mentally. Could it be that you are one such person, hence the oversensitive reaction and hurling of insults?
Conversely, going to paid classes is not just for "overgrown kids". Paying for education, whether via a teacher, or via a book written by an expert, is not just for overgrown kids.
"Are you that stupid? "
Are you that stupid?
"How many hours did the guy who conceived of this thing we're typing on waste on "higher" education? "
No wonder your students tune you out. You sound like a horrendously bad teacher.
"Your points on my nostalgia and lack of historical understanding are so underdeveloped that there's no answering them. "
Compared to your points where you long for authority, and make a whole bunch of a priori assumptions?
"You might get a grip on explaining what you mean before you try to communicate your thoughts to another. "
Same to you. You might also learn to read.
"I'm guessing you're an overgrown kid."
I'm guessing you're probably the worst teacher at your college, which is why you're always complaining about your students on CD. Hint, the problem isn't them. Nor is it society in general. It is you. Look in the mirror.
Also, you're not the only one who can sling insults around.
Yes, there is an epic struggle going on right now, between Darkness and Light ! Lucifer/ delusion or Maya, is a strong foe, but that IS part of the Lila, the Grand Play. As the awakening human consciousness joins the struggle the tide will turn to the Light. More people MUST become part of the solutions; every good, sincere effort, counts !
Great post, Elizabeth! Many of the 'psychologists' are psychopaths themselves! Here's a great quote I found the other day by JK:
"War is the spectacular, crude projection of our everyday life, isn't it true?"
Uh, Dude, you seem to miss the whole point of military training; the goal is to produce unquestioning soldiers. Orders are to be followed, not debated. If you don't understand this, the Nuclear Age Peace Foundation needs a new writer.
The USAF knew from the early 60s that a small number of Lanch Offcers will balk when the order arrives. There are 2 Lanch Officers for every silo, but only one is needed for launch (ignore all those silly Cold War novels/movies about 2 keys needed to be rotated simultaneously for launch).
Under the Geneva Conventions and the U.S. Uniform Code of Military Justice (UCMJ) it is only legal orders that are to be followed. A soldier has a moral and legal obligation under the Geneva Conventions and the UCMJ to in fact disobey illegal orders.
I believe that any order to launch a first strike using nuclear weapons is immoral and illegal.
I agree with you; nukes are immoral.
However, an order to launch will come directly from POTUS, and UCMJ mandates following POTUS' orders without question. Period.
The UCMJ does not mandate the blind allegiance of a service member to any superior, and that includes the President of the United States. Under no circumstances are American service members bound to follow orders that are illegal. The UCMJ makes it abundantly clear that an American service member is duty bound to disobey an illegal order. The failure to disobey an illegal order makes a service member as culpable as their superior who issued the illegal order. This precedent was established at the Nuremberg Trials in 1945-46.
The high-minded rhetoric about military personnel being solemnly authorized and charged to always act in good conscience-- to use their personal judgement to refuse to follow illegal orders, if only because they may be held accountable for blindly and reflexively following such orders-- is manifestly a heinous hypocritical fraud and swindle.
Or, to use the Orwellian term, a perfect example of rationalized doublethink.
Since you mention 1945, I may as well hitch a ride on the Wayback Machine:
My late, great Archie Bunker-type dad was a reluctant draftee in World War II, but in spite of himself he became a master sergeant.
In later life, he espoused a contradictory mix of anti-authoritarianism-- "I always thought the bosses were lousy", he remarked once not long before he died-- and nostalgic regard for some of the officers he served under in the Big One.
When the "Generation Gap" reared its troublesome head during the late 1960s, my father liked to tell about the time he was attached to the provost marshal in France and became a de facto jailkeeper for soldiers hauled in by the MPs.
Once a rowdy recidivist troublemaker was collared after briefly going AWOL and getting drunk and disorderly in a local village. I always pictured The Kid as a young, unregenerate James Dean or Marlon Brando "rebel" type, because that was the way dad made him sound.
The climax of the story occurred when a captain came by on some official business, perhaps to take charge of the wayward Kid, and asked the prisoner why the hell he kept spitting the bit.
"I'm an individual, sir!" the recalcitrant miscreant supposedly replied. This set off the captain, who thundered out the riot act: "Individual! That's a word you should've left in the States, son!"
According to dad, the captain went on to give a rousing speech about "individual" having no place in a war and an army whose success depended on THOUSANDS of men working together as a team, etc.
The speech so impressed my Paternal Unit that he quoted it fairly substantially some decades later; I can't remember much of it, because naturally I found it all horribly tendentious and tedious in the extreme.
In general, as that anonymous captain's speech suggested, all forms of military training are designed to break down the "individual", and especially their capacity for idiosyncratic judgement and will.
Since combat-related duties are especially repugnant to anyone with a modicum of compassion, sympathy, and humanity, the military's tacit Prime Directive is to minimize and extirpate these qualities as much as possible in basic training, and ensure that the trainees emerge as effective, even enthusiastic homicidal followers.
In short, they are conditioned to implicitly trust or in any case mindlessly and reflexively accept and follow orders; they are expected to rely upon their highly-conditioned lizard brains, and not risk impairing and degrading the team effort by engaging their problematic cerebral cortices.
That way lies individualism, the path to insubordination or worse.
So it is plainly a monstrous face-saving hypocrisy for the authorities to sweep their true mission of facilitating the existence of hordes of mindlessly obedient, amoral meat puppets under the pious rug of "good conscience" and individual accountability.
As appalling as john-boy's blunt brutality is, it effectively gives the lie to the two-faced civilian and military command that pretends we can have it both ways. And will self-righteously come down like the Sword of God after the fact to second-guess individual subordinates who've been placed in a hopelessly paradoxical bind and made the "wrong" choice.
ObedientServant,
I served 15 years in the United States Army. I served 4 years in the Infantry as an 11/Bravo. I served 11 years in the Medical Corps as a 61/Alpha-Foxtrot. During those 15 years of service I did 2 combat tours.
I have ample experience with the dilemma of conscience that a service member faces when having to make a determination as to what constitutes a legal or an illegal order. I have participated in general court-martial proceedings and had associates who were court-martialed on various charges related to failure to deploy during a troop movement.
As pointed out by another participant in this thread, who actually provides the language from the relevant clauses in the Uniform Code of Military Justice (UCMJ), the UCMJ is quite explicit as to what a service member's responsibility is when faced with the task to perform what constitutes an illegal order. What is open to interpretation in individual cases is what constitutes a legal or an illegal order.
I present you with a hypothetical that is not uncommon in combat. You are an infantry platoon leader. Your platoon comes to a clearing with surrounding hills. As platoon leader, you have concerns that the clearing is mined or that there may be enemy in the hills that could ambush your platoon within the clearing. Rather than blindly advance your platoon into the clearing, you order one to two men to traverse the clearing. As platoon leader have you issued a legal order? What if the men that you ordered to traverse the clearing knowing that they could draw enemy fire refuse your order? Have these men committed a breach in military discipline by failing to carry out your order?
If a service member exercises his/her conscience and disobeys an order from a superior on the grounds that the order was illegal, that service member must be able to defend that decision before a board of inquiry. Depending on what type of order was not obeyed and the discretion of the officer who oversees an initial inquiry, the service member may have to defend their decision to disobey an order at a general
court-martial proceeding.
There are no doubt inequities in the military justice system. The fact remains that when you enter the military you give up certain freedoms that other Americans enjoy. But, if a service member is faced with a decision of carrying out an order that they deem to be illegal, you damn sure should err on the side of caution and not perform that order. In most cases, the consequences of following an illegal order are greater than those of not following a lawful order. Unless it is clear that an order from a superior is illegal, all that a service member has to guide them in making a decision to follow such an order is their morals.
I appreciate your response, Photius.
I wasn't particularly disputing or arguing with your original comment.
I was just venting at the "pat" standard rationale that makes it sound as if service members can be reasonably expected to determine in the first place when orders are illegal, and get a fair shake if they disobey orders in good conscience.
I was just pointing out that this rationale conveniently ignores or minimizes the reality that military training intentionally seeks to override or short-circuit individual judgement, insofar as it subordinates it to authority and group needs and goals.
In short, it seems to me that the truth of the matter is that it's much more of a "damned if you do, damned if you don't" dilemma.
Photius
Perhaps you are referring to certain sections of the UCMJ which I had mentioned in the past which specifically state that soldiers have a right as well as an obligation to NOT obey orders that they believe are illegal such as:
* 809.ART.90 [20] which makes it clear that military personnel need to obey the "lawful command of his superior officer"
* 891.ART.91 [2], the "lawful" order of a warrant officer
* 892.ART.92 [1] the "lawful order of a warrant officer"
* 892.ART.92 (2) "lawful order"
The above citations are taken from Professor Lawrence Mosqueda's article ["A Duty to Disobey All Unlawful Orders"] which was posted just before the invasion of Iraq on February 27, 2003.on CounterPunch. Professor Mosqueda teaches at The Evergreen State College in Olympia, Wa.
http://www.counterpunch.org/mosqueda02272003.html
Know when to cooperate and know when to be an individual--what to work together FOR, and what to refrain from participation in. One has to know oneself to do that. The military loves to get the kids young: programming them is so much easier that way.
I'm going to have to disagree with you.
The military oath taken at the time of induction reads:
"I,____________, do solemnly swear (or affirm) that I will support and defend the Constitution of the United States against all enemies, foreign and domestic; that I will bear true faith and allegiance to the same; and that I will obey the orders of the President of the United States and the orders of the officers appointed over me, according to the regulations and the Uniform Code of Military Justice. So help me God"
The Uniform Code of Military Justice (UCMJ) 809.ART.90 (20), makes it clear that military personnel need to obey the "lawful command of his superior officer," 891.ART.91 (2), the "lawful order of a warrant officer", 892.ART.92 (1) the "lawful general order", 892.ART.92 (2) "lawful order". In each case, military personnel have an obligation and a duty to only obey Lawful orders and indeed have an obligation to disobey Unlawful orders, including orders by the president that do not comply with the UCMJ. The moral and legal obligation is to the U.S. Constitution and not to those who would issue unlawful orders, especially if those orders are in direct violation of the Constitution and the UCMJ.
So far, I am sure that we agree. However, you are saying that the use of nukes, or first strike, is unlawful.
George W. Bush took care of that with a number of signing statements. Also known as the Bush Doctrine. A US preemptive nuclear strike is legal under the Constitution, though many will debate the opposite.
WTF,
Signing statements do not carry the force of law like the U.S. Constitution. Bush also signed laws against torture with signing statements that indicated that he would reserve the right to use torture in violation of the law he signed. That does not mean that if Bush had proceeded with authorizing the use of torture in violation of the law that he signed that he would not be violating the law.
I again hold that the United States' use of a preemptive nuclear strike is not only illegal but also immoral. Under the Geneva Conventions that we are party to, which by the Constitution since they are an international treaty are the law of the land, preemptive war is illegal and a crime against humanity. Presidential signing statements cannot contravene international treaties that we are party to.
The President will always stand behind the authority of the Executive.
The 2006 document National Security Strategy of the United States outlines the Bush Doctrine, which make legal "preemptive strikes against potential enemies" (not my words, the President's).
Obama has done nothing to roll this back.
Now such a move may be deemed illegal by foreign observers, but the US has veto power in the UN and International Courts, and so could never be held accountable if we decided to, e.g., turn Iran to glass.
Yes, it is immoral. Yes, it is unethical. Yes, it really is stupid. But in US law, it is legal.
WTF
You make it appear that your last sentence is a supposed obvious truth and that those in the military would be foolish not to obey the orders that they are given by their commanding officers. But as I thought I had demonstrated by my comment at 6:57 pm on Aug. 2 the UCMJ clearly states that military personnel have not only a duty but also a right NOT to obey the orders that they are given if they believe that those orders are illegal. Apparently it should be pointed out that the oath that military personnel took when they entered the military [which at one time included myself] states that loyalty to the U.S. Constitution clearly supersedes that of the President and their comrades.
The searing documentary Sir! No Sir! and David Cortright's classic work Soldiers In Revolt: GI Resistance During the Vietnam War, which among other works can be found in Sir! No Sir!, is proof that not all soldiers have to be robots. As former Green Beret Master Sergeant Donald Duncan wisely noted in Sir! No Sir!:
"I was doing it right but I wasn't doing right"
I don't have any issues with what you or Photius have written - I agree with you.
What I have been stating (apparently poorly - I apologize for that) is that Executive Authority is such these days that almost *anything* the President commands is legal in the US. The White House Legal Office, with support from the DoJ, will twist their interpretation of the law and/or signing statements to defend the President from prosecution.
George W Bush is free today, and is making money during lecture tours crowing about the invasion of Iraq (and torture, and FISA, and etc). He is free because he is protected by Executive Authority, and because the current occupant was too gutless to rescind Bush's signing statements, which would have exposed Bush to prosecution.
I am trying to say that a nuclear first-strike order from the President would be viewed by both the White House Legal Office and DoJ as being legal (that it is morally reprehensible is beyond the mandate of these offices). Any soldier that viewed the President's order any other way and refused to carry out the order would be expressing a personal opinion, and thus in dereliction of duty.
Any Launch Officer that refused to conduct their duty could be court-martialed, and if the US was at war, (as voted upon by Congress) could face summary execution. We know that during war games, any Launch Officer that hesitates in their duty is removed from the position and relocated to lesser duties in another unit.
A couple of yrs ago, a group of high officers, including C. Powell, wrote an article in "Foreign Affairs" that stated that their opinions were that in these "modern" times, no one below the rank of President had any duty to examine the legality of any order.
This, inspite of the oath of officers, that I remember very clearly, mentioning "...legal orders...".
They serve only power, not principle.
That is why the United States is on the high road to tyranny. Remember in the scandal that surrounded the Bush Justice Department's firing of a number of U.S. Attorneys, a number of former Justice Department officials who testified before congressional committees were questioned on the Justice Department's requirement that applicants for Justice Department jobs sign a pledge of allegiance to President Bush. These officials stated under oath that it was their duty to act as they did because they had sworn allegiance to the President. The forgot their oath to uphold the Constitution of the United States. History is replete with the consequences of military men and civilian officials having blind allegiance and unquestioning obedience to authority.
I have not read the article that you are referring to. It would come as no surprise to me that General Powell would have been capable of contributing to such an article with such an opinion. This is a man who was opposed to the invasion of Iraq. Rather than have the courage to follow his conscience and resign in opposition to the policy, General Powell blindly supported President Bush's plans for waging an immoral and illegal preemptive war against Iraq and also gave damning false testimony on Iraq's possession of WMD before the Security Council and General Assembly of the United Nations that will forever taint his legacy.
General Powell as a young field grade officer in Vietnam was a member of the Americal Division. Powell appeared to have played a role in whitewashing the initial reports of the massacre at My Lai. He may have never been the honorable military man that he was thought to be. Like many officers, he may have been nothing more than a ticket punching opportunist.
This article, like an earlier article by Andrew Bacevich demonstrates the odious conjunction of religion and militarism.
The U.S. Air Force is doing nothing new. Since antiquity militarists have recognized that religion could be used as a force to motivate soldiers and civilians to commit acts of atrocity against their fellow man.
These ballistic missile officers have the same mentality as the knights who responded in 1095 C.E. to the Pope's call for a holy crusade. They are holy warriors who have received a commission from God.
Like Arnaud-Armaury, the Abbot of Citeaux, the Papal Legate who was reported to have said when asked who among the captive heretics at Beziers should be killed; "Kill them all, God will know his own", these ballistic missile officers' view is "launch the missiles and kill them all, God will know his own and sort out the innocent".
PHOTIUS:
I take issue with this idea that "it's always been done," as if the conjunction of religion and militarism during the Crusades had at its disposal the modern equivalent of weapons of mass destruction. You're pretty cavalier in dismissing the whole premise of human growth, progress, or evolution.
Just as a few in the forum PRETEND that there's no perturbation taking place, that hurricanes, fires, floods, and heat-waves have always happened... this brand of thought seems intent upon anesthetizing the perception process. It makes it SEEM that any uptick is meaningless. "Nothing to see here, just keep on walking..."
You are doing the same thing in your post... dismissing something that is truly odious, by using the past as a twisted basis for its rationale!
Others do the same thing when they paint with the broad brush stroke that politicans have always been corrupt. Again, that turns the evident uptick in a very dangerous collusion between both parties, along with the cancerous growth of the lobby system, into something virtually irrelevant. "Hey, why worry? That's the way it's always been..."
There's a black or white subtext being conveyed that covers up an awful lot. If it's always been done, then there's nothing new. Except that this pretext is utter bullshit... given the current level of intensity, added to frequency. Plus we're supposed to LEARN from history's examples, not redundantly repeat them. And it's not like some of us have not learned. It's that those who have grabbed power by legal and illegal means have bent matters to their own sickening metrics.
So while there is a grain of truth to what you say in exposing the roots of this pattern, the way you say it appears to normalize the unconscionable. You show no objection, as you white-wash over the fact that modern times and modern weapons add substantially to a diabolical mix. It is NOT a norm. It's what happens when power manages to corrupt absolutely. And there are few powers so tantalizingly deceptive as that of "God wants you to do this. So do not hesitate: drop this bomb!"
Do you identify yourself as an authoritarian? Your strict adherence to certain historical constructs presents you as one inordinately resistant to any concept (or God forbid potential for progress) that lies outside the circumference of a thought process rigidly defined by and through its own box.
Siouxrose I wish that you would get off of your soapbox and read more carefully what I have written before you post such a diatribe criticizing and grossly misrepresenting my thought.
I simply was providing the premise of the authors article with an historical framework when I pointed out that a conjunction has existed between militarism and religion since antiquity. That is an historical fact that is beyond dispute. That fact in and of itself says nothing about the morality of this conjunction. In my post, I stated that the conjunction of militarism and religion was odious.
In my post I said nothing specifically about human growth or humankind's potential for growth. The fact that we continue to see the conjunction of militarism and religion despite the widespread suffering that it has caused humankind is sufficient reason to call into question how much humankind has grown, evolved, or progressed. That lack of growth has nothing to do with the mythical god Mars.
I dismissed nothing in my post. My citing of the Crusades was not a justification for the indoctrination process that is pointed out in the article. It was to cite evidence that the same process of indoctrination that was used during the Crusades to recruit knights and motivate them is being currently used by the United States Air Force to motivate ballistic missile officers to do the unthinkable. Although the knights of the Crusades lacked the modern technology that we possess, they committed atrocities against their fellow man over three hundred years of warfare that exceeded those committed to this date with nuclear weapons. I am making no moral equivalency between the horrors of the Crusades and the potential horrors of nuclear weaponry. I am simply pointing out that religion is being used by the Air Force to motivate ballistic missile officers to perform their duty just as it was used to motivate knights during the Crusades.
Siouxrose wrote:
"There's a black or white subtext being conveyed that covers up an awful lot. If it's always been done, then there's nothing new. Except that this pretext is utter bullshit... given the current level of intensity, added to frequency. Plus we're supposed to LEARN from history's examples, not redundantly repeat them. And it's not like some of us have not learned. It's that those who have grabbed power by legal and illegal means have bent matters to their own sickening metrics"
There is a subtext within my prior comments that "there is nothing new under the sun." This is not BULLSHIT. It is an acknowledgement of reality. All that is different is the magnitude of the threat that humankind faces by not recognizing the conjunction of religion and militarism. Although we are supposed to LEARN from the mistakes of history, humankind hasn't. What is important is not that people like you have learned from the mistakes of the past. What is important is that in your words ; "those who have grabbed power by legal and illegal means have bent matters to their own sickening metrics." They are the ones who have not learned from the lessons of the past and thus threaten the very survival of humankind.
Siouxrose further wrote:
"So while there is a grain of truth to what you say in exposing the roots of this pattern, the way you say it appears to normalize the unconscionable. You show no objection, as you white-wash over the fact that modern times and modern weapons add substantially to a diabolical mix. It is NOT a norm. It's what happens when power manages to corrupt absolutely. And there are few powers so tantalizingly deceptive as that of "God wants you to do this. So do not hesitate: drop this bomb!"
You again misrepresent what I wrote and my thought. I stated unequivocally that in my view the use of nuclear weapons was immoral and illegal. What in this statement appears to normalize the unconscionable?
Siouxrose further wrote:
"Do you identify yourself as an authoritarian? Your strict adherence to certain historical constructs presents you as one inordinately resistant to any concept (or God forbid potential for progress) that lies outside the circumference of a thought process rigidly defined by and through its own box."
I find the above inquiry and later comment to be insulting. I am not an authoritarian. I am an atheist freethinker. As to my strict adherence to so called historical constructs presenting me as one who is resistant to any concept that lies outside the circumference of a thought process rigidly defined by and through its own box, I would say that the same applies to your thought which often lies within a pseudo-scientific, superstitious, astrological, spiritual, and mystical box that has absolutely no applicability to objective reality.
You are arguing FROM a number of constructs that you believe represent the full spectrum of discourse.
First, like Andrew Bacevich, your views are pro-military, and you write from the position of an insider. The only difference I can discern is that you think you hold higher moral principles in drawing the line where it comes to nuclear weapons. I object to militarism and question ANY ONE who signed up after the Vietnam debacle.
Second, you are CLUELESS about feminism, and the viable basis for questioning a patriarchal status quo that YOU take for reality. Many of us do not. It argues its own rationale inside a tautology based on its own limited philosophical metrics. Since I don't agree with this limited paradigm, nor see it as one that defines humanity, I will noit argue the points you've taken that reflect back upon (this illegitimate) model.
Third, your rigid worldview maintains the exact same play-out that you then argue represents the inevitable reach of history. This is like someone who shoots himself in the foot to argue he can't dance.
What to you is pseudo-science or superstitious is quite viable to the millions who are not limited by the paradigm you confine yourself to. What you call objective reality is precisely the device that got mankind to the edge of the current abyss... yet you think this evidence warrants arguing for more of same?
People like you who refuse to see other than the reality they "so bravely fight to enforce upon others" are standing in the way of the change that is meant to come.
You're still a soldier through and through, a rigid thinker with a DEAD heart. I could care less about reaching someone like you... it's the narrowness of your arguments, and the scholarship you use to reinforce your narrow worldview that I feel a moral need, even responsibility, to discredit.
Just as fundamentalist ministers can eke out Scripture in support of their hate-based rules, you have found tidbits of history to reinforce yours. I feel sorry for atheists, because all around them the poetry of the marvelous pulses, but all they can identify with are their rulebooks, maps, and cold, linear STERILE projections of the ego-driven intellect, a walled off castle that cannot know the Life of the Spirit. Because the religious ethos they were raised in betrayed them, they therefore cannot find cause to believe in something greater than their flawed selves, something in the way of a Source.
Here's a prediction for 'ya, and should it happen, I'd like to come to mind... you will one day face a health crisis or accident where your Spirit will cross over. You will encounter the very thing (or place) that exists beyond where logic can go. And you will spend what's left of your life reconciling this unexpected fracture to the fortress of your awareness that allowed Light into the tunnel... thereby shifting the views you once were so convinced were Right, substantially from there.
It was men like you who burned women like me for these beliefs over the centuries. If you think you own the moral high ground now, I've got real cosmic news for you.
It may be years before my prophecy delivers... but I trust, it shall.
Siouxrose,
You continue to misconstrue my thought. My views unlike some of Andrew Bacevich's are not pro-military. Also, all of Andrew Bacevich's views are not pro-military. I resigned a military commission after 15 years of service on political grounds. You cannot cite one comment of mine in this thread or upon CD that is pro-military. Your assertion that I am pro-military is simply dishonest.
Your questioning of the sincerity of anyone who is opposed to militarism who served in the military in the aftermath of the debacle of Vietnam simply reflects your shallowness. There are tens of thousands of Americans who served in the military in the aftermath of the Vietnam War who are opposed to militarism. According to your twisted logic, you question the sincerity of tens of thousands of Americans who are veterans of the armed forces like me. I unlike you lack the arrogance to advance such a proposition when there is no way that I can possess knowledge of the sincerity of someone's beliefs, particularly a service veteran who has seen and experienced the hazards of militarism firsthand.
Second, you don't know any of my views on feminism.
Third, simply because millions hold superstitious views like you do, that provides no evidence for the verity of the claims that mystics and spiritualists like you make even if these superstitious beliefs and claims give you some level of comfort.
As children many of us believed in Santa Claus, the tooth fairy, and many other entities for which we had no objective evidence. Belief in Santa Claus and the tooth fairy gave many of us comfort. When faced with evidence that such entities do not exists, we generally expect that rational beings will then hold disbelief in such entities. Continuing to hold belief in Santa Claus and the tooth fairy might give someone comfort, but we would generally hold that such belief is irrational since we have no evidence for the existence of Santa Claus and the tooth fairy . Should someone provide me with incontrovertible evidence for the existence of Santa Claus and the tooth fairy, I would be willing to suspend my disbelief in Santa Claus and the tooth fairy.
I would say the same for your superstitious spiritual claims for the existence of "souls", "demons", "Life of the Spirit", "God", "Divine Force", "Source", "the effects of celestial bodies upon human behavior and physical events", and other metaphysical entities that you constantly elaborate upon. If you were to provide me with evidence for the existence of such entities I would be willing to suspend my disbelief in them.
Sioxrose wrote:
"Just as fundamentalist ministers can eke out Scripture in support of their hate-based rules, you have found tidbits of history to reinforce yours. I feel sorry for atheists, because all around them the poetry of the marvelous pulses, but all they can identify with are their rulebooks, maps, and cold, linear STERILE projections of the ego-driven intellect, a walled off castle that cannot know the Life of the Spirit. Because the religious ethos they were raised in betrayed them, they therefore cannot find cause to believe in something greater than their flawed selves, something in the way of a Source"
I have responded to the above drivel that you have written previously. Your thought simply reflects your ignorance of atheists' beliefs. Atheists like me believe in nonphysical entities like thoughts and ideas. We also believe in beauty, emotions, moral values and all of the things that give richness to human life. Unlike you, most of us don't believe in entities that require supernatural explanations.
Siouxrose further wrote:
"Here's a prediction for 'ya, and should it happen, I'd like to come to mind... you will one day face a health crisis or accident where your Spirit will cross over. You will encounter the very thing (or place) that exists beyond where logic can go. And you will spend what's left of your life reconciling this unexpected fracture to the fortress of your awareness that allowed Light into the tunnel... thereby shifting the views you once were so convinced were Right, substantially from there."
You don't have a shred of evidence that any of us possesses a Spirit or the existence of anything (or place) that we cross over to beyond where logic can go. You are just spouting more pseudo-scientific psychobabble and metaphysical nonsense for which you have no empirical evidence.
Your assertion that it was men like me who burned women like you at the stake is the typical ad hominem type attacks you resort to when your arguments lack merit. Atheists did not burn women at the stake for their superstitious beliefs. It was superstitious religionists who believed that they were following the commands that God gave humankind in holy writ that burned women and men at the stake for being witches or holding beliefs that were deemed to be heretical. Oh, excuse me. I'm just being misogynistic and narrow minded in citing history to support my argument in response to your absurd assertion. You might do well to review some history before you post some of the nonsense that you do. That way you won't appear to be so ignorant.
I don't possess your clairvoyance, prophetic abilities, or other abilities that you might possess such as psi, chi, ESP or telekinesis. I can assure that no matter how much I disagree with you on a host of issues, I would never wish you harm within this life or in the afterlife that you believe in.
deleted
Siouxrose,
I have great respect for your passion and eloquence, but sometimes you are just way off base.
When you are deep in a hole it is usually time to stop digging,
seamus
If only the USAF was behaving similar to the First Crusaders.
A fair number of the First Crusaders answered the call out of material self-interest, not the desire to fight a holy war.
During the 1st crusade, it was not all that uncommon for one group of Christian crusaders to ally with one group of Muslim locals to fight against another group of Christian crusaders allied with another group of Muslim locals.
The idea that the crusades were only about religious war, is a deliberate lie promoted by fundamentalist types.
rfloh,
You like another thread participant grossly misrepresents what I wrote. At no point did I say that the Crusades were only about religious war. I pointed out that the First Crusades represented a time in which there was a conjunction of militarism and religion. Do you deny that there was a conjunction of militarism and religion at the time of the First Crusades?
In your comment that;"it was not all that uncommon for one group of Christian crusaders to ally with one group of Muslim locals to fight against another group of Christian crusaders allied with another group of Muslim locals", you fail to recognize that regardless of their motivations, the warring parties, both Christian and Islamic, represented groups in which there was a conjunction of religion and militarism.
I don't know what history books that you have been reading, but the USAF during some of its campaigns has acted just like the First Crusaders and subsequent Crusaders in its indiscriminate killing of civilian populations.
Untold numbers of innocent Jews were slaughtered in Europe as the First Crusaders made their way to the Holy Land. When the First Crusaders arrived in the Holy Land countless numbers of the civilian population were slaughtered. Raymond of Aguilers wrote: "in the Temple and porch of Solomon men rode in blood up to their knees and bridle reins." Raymond of Aguilers was probably exaggerating to some extent, but multiple accounts from participants indicates that the loss of civilian lives was significant.
The USAF has killed hundreds of thousands of innocent civilians in its bombing campaigns from the time of saturation bombing of civilian populations in WWII until the bombings that it is currently undertaking using manned aircraft and unmanned drones in Iraq, Afghanistan, Yemen, Pakistan, Libya, and Somalia.
"I pointed out that the First Crusades represented a time in which there was a conjunction of militarism and religion. Do you deny that there was a conjunction of militarism and religion at the time of the First Crusades?"
BFD. There is usually a conjunction of multiple factors when wars happen. One of those factors is nearly always material economic factors.
"you fail to recognize that regardless of their motivations, the warring parties, both Christian and Islamic, represented groups in which there was a conjunction of religion and militarism."
Yeah. Who cares about the reasons why people do something eh? Let's just force fit our theories onto them.
"Untold numbers of innocent Jews were slaughtered in Europe as the First Crusaders made their way to the Holy Land. When the First Crusaders arrived in the Holy Land countless numbers of the civilian population were slaughtered. Raymond of Aguilers wrote: "in the Temple and porch of Solomon men rode in blood up to their knees and bridle reins." Raymond of Aguilers was probably exaggerating to some extent, but multiple accounts from participants indicates that the loss of civilian lives was significant."
This is true of pretty much all war.
The BFD is that the author of the article was not talking about a conjunction of multiple factors in a decision to launch nuclear armed ballistic missiles. He was specifically writing on the conjunction of militarism and religion. That is what I commented on. I took exception to you misrepresenting what I wrote.
Your reply confirms my assertion that the USAF has behaved just like the First Crusaders did. They both committed immoral acts in killing countless innocent civilians. Yes this killing of civilians happens pretty much in all wars. What was your point in writing that the USAF should behave like the First Crusaders did?
The BFD is that the author of the article was not talking about a conjunction of multiple factors in a decision to launch nuclear armed ballistic missiles. He was specifically writing on the conjunction of militarism and religion. That is what I commented on. I took exception to you misrepresenting what I wrote.
Your reply confirms my assertion that the USAF has behaved just like the First Crusaders did. They both committed immoral acts in killing countless innocent civilians. Yes this killing of civilians happens pretty much in all wars. What was your point in writing that the USAF should behave like the First Crusaders did?
deleted
I want launch officers who will launch on orders.
If some national leader of any other country thinks they can attack the USA and survive, having a credible nuclear response is critical to the safety of the USA.
The only qualification I would have, is no first use of nukes, except to prevent invasion.
WAR is Hell, and the nuclear arsenal is the Hell our enemies deserve.
"Except to prevent invasion"? Isn't that always the US's excuse: they were about to. They were about to develop the nuclear bomb, so we'd better. They had WMD they were about to use on us, so we'd better attack them. Etc. We're masters of the pre-emptive strike.
OK, we should have a stock of mindless barbarians who will obey. Always need some around, huh? The problem is, you fool, is that the further up the chain of command, all you have is barbarians in fancy clothes. And they're not mindless; they're deep into the art of chaos and destruction as a means of pulling all the booty out while everyone's running around in panic, grief, starvation, depravation, and sheer horror. You're right. War is hell. Maybe if we'd stop being the #1 producers, there would be less hell on earth, ya think?
Or in short, you'e an idiot.
Elizabeth, I had one of those misreadings that actually seems to fit, IMHO. "The problem is, you fool, is that the further up the chain of command, all you have is barbarians in fancy clothes."
What I read was... that the fuhrer up the chain of command...
And you know it really does make sense even if the grammar is a bit rough.
"The only qualification I would have, is no first use of nukes, except to prevent invasion. "
I suggest you rethink your qualification. We invaded AfPak and Iraq "to fight them over there, so that we wouldn't have to fight them here". Implicit in that statement was imminent invasion by brown-skinned people. This would meet your criteria for a first nuclear strike.
You're an idealist, aren't you? Lemme tell you something about this kind of war, if you launch your arsenal of nuclear weapons on orders from your government you will die. It's the enemy who dies under the bombs that will die the lucky and mostly pain free deaths. You and yours will die from radiation poisoning, cancers, the effects of a civilization that collapsed because it didn't have the shit it needed anymore.
These 'officers' are willing to kill not only their enemies, but also their commanders, their fellow soldiers, their families, their children and grandchildren. But you cheer for them?
Fuck you.
If only Stanislav Petrov had felt the same in 1983. We'd never have had to worry about this conversation...
Bart Centre who blogs as Dromedary Hump at the site Atheist Camel at http://atheistcamel.blogspot.com/ has the following take on this subject. He supports the position stated by johnboy1@gmx.us
"Friday, July 29, 2011
The Air Force invokes God...and I think I agree.
A Facebook friend posted an article from the Center for Inquiry to my fb page. It seems the Air Force has included a discussion of religious/biblical justification for nuclear war as part of the training for those charged with launching nuclear missiles. Here is the short article, worth a two minute read: http://www.centerforinquiry.net/news/cfi_condemns_use_of_religious_materials_for_instruction_in_nuclear_war_ethi
I am ambivalent. Not sure where I land on this. My instincts tell me that with the hyper-religiosity inherent in the Air Force Academy (a major issue with the Military Religious Freedom Foundation) and throughout the military services that this is another proselytizing attempt at worst, or the unnecessary invoking of Judeo-Christian doctrine at best.
But on the other hand there is a reality that must be confronted. A vast portion of the military is in fact Christian. They were before they entered the military, and carry that affliction around with them on active duty. In the unique position these nuclear missile specialists are in, they would be faced with a life changing ethical/moral dilemma in the event they are asked to launch nuclear weapons. The very thought of such an event should send shivers up all of our spines as its ramifications, including global nuclear war, is the stuff nightmares are made of.
If any one of those airmen hesitates just long enough to ask the question "What would Jesus Do?” or start babbling prayers for guidance, or fumbling with their rosary beads and waiting for a sign from God during the critical moment, we could well be worse off as a nation than had the launch order been immediately executed...unquestioned and instantaneously. If by settling the religious issue or, shall I say, if by justifying mass killing on religious grounds as part of training it eliminates that hesitation, then this may in fact be a reasoned and logical approach.
So, it's not proselytizing to non-Xtians, or even the government endorsing one religion over another. It’s a matter of recognition that the job of these selected few, largely believing, must never be impaired by thinking too hard on how their deity perceives mass destruction. They lay it out and nail it shut: “He's done it lots of times, and He has endorsed it lots more... it’s all good. So be ready to push the button on command.”
PHOTIUS: Does it not occur to you that one who truly was a Chrisitan, which is to say followed the teachings of the Master of Peace, would not, could not serve in a capacity that might bring hell-fire and damnation onto thousands of civlians (placing aside the inane premise of an enemy, or insurgent, or enemy combatant, at all)?
Just as the modern church inverted Jesus' teachings about taking care of the poor, into the "new prosperity ethos" that instead focuses on each separate self aspiring to become rich (Calvinism on steroids), it similarly seeks to deconstruct the messages of peace into one of being willing to KILL for "god."
This is really sick stuff. I don't care how deep you dig into the archives of HIS-story for precedents, what's amoral remains amoral. And it is my view, as a card-carrying feminist, that these sick inversions of thought, itself, that turn the destruction of life and living systems into the premise of "Defense," are exclusively macho notions. They are the direct projections of the god of war; and it's not exactly a coincidence, that this archetype got pumped up through Hollywood films just when the U.S. corporations made a KILLING from W. W II.
Eisenhower saw the writing on the wall: that war was very good for U.S. businesses. Therefore, as fitting to the playbook preferred by The Disaster Capitalists, war became the U.S.'s chief business. And when a disaster didn't happen on its own, as was seen in the case being FIXED for war with Iraq, it could be engineered. After all, isn't that what a captured media is all about?
To justify this upping of the ante on the make-war state, the fundamentalist authoritarian campaigns got on-board. All those congregants, like sheep, looking for direction... the more insidious and uncertain the times, the greater their need for a "father knows best" figure to guide them. And what did the churches do with this responsiblity? Use it along the same lines as those allotted the PUBLIC'S AIR WAVES to spread the chants of hatred of other!
NONE of this is remotely akin to the teachings of Jesus. Not any of it! It IS fitting to the war god Mars. As is a nation that can strip funds away from poor kids, libraries, and elderly widows... in order to support its make-war machine.
Once again, I feel that you white wash over the moral repugnance at work... trying to use the past to justify it.
HIS-story is largely the voice of MEN. Men sat at the decision making bodies. Men owned the land and resources (although as many in the forum justifiably point out, that was not true of Black men, or men who had no land or money from their family lineages, or often their honest labors). The voice of the Feminine has been excluded.
CD had a recent article about the future and destiny of Pakistan (or was it Afghanistan?) and the entire circle of decison-makers were men. While that is not totally true (to that extent) in the U.S. today, its foundation was built on a male-only set of perceptions and premises. The entire Judeo-Christian heritage grants power to men, and less privilege to women. Thus women who do attain influence today, generally must adapt to the "standards" of the pre-existing status quo. Note what happened to Sybil Edmonds or Elizabeth Warren for speaking truth to power, and trying to change the boys' club?
This is not about blaming men. Only right wing idiots see it that way. It's about understanding that a society built on an unbalanced foundation, cannot produce balanced values or priorities. Also missing are minority voices, the wisdom of the Indigenous, and any others who have been systematically excluded for centuries.
His-tory speaks the language of warfare, for it is largely the expression of Mars. And as the pantheon argues, there are other equally viable archetypes that exist precisely to thwart the power of Mars so that war does not become the inevitable byproduct of any society that views itself as empowered. This is why I argue for the larger understanding. For it is ONLY when we cede spiritual power to Mars rules, that we believe that what history reflects is a full indication of human nature, or that which is inevitable. I do NOT agree. What we witness is what happens due to the primacy allotted to Mars by cultures that were led to this deceit by the church-state that modeled itself far more in the image and likeness of warrior Rome, than in light of the teachings allotted by Jesus.
The circle will replace the hierarchy after The Transition ...