If you are safely at home, it may be relatively easy for you to find persuasive arguments for a war – or a “military intervention”, as it is called in today’s Newspeak -, e.g. in Afghanistan, Iraq, maybe one day in Iran. However, would you still favour it if you were a soldier yourself, assigned to go to war, fight there, kill, or even die there, for political intentions which are intransparent and highly disputable, or if you were a soldier’s mother, father, daugther, son, girl- or boyfriend? Would you like to see your sweetheart killing or being killed? Is that worth such a unique human life like yours or that of your love? Isn’t it two-faced to advocate a war far far away, fought by others you don’t know, while remaining safely seated in your armchair and watching it, among others, in your evening news?
Thanks to the young whistleblower Bradley Manning, who is currently imprisoned in Kuwait (Oct. 2011), and thanks to Wikileaks, the following video has been revealed: Recorded from the gun-sight of an Apache helicopter, it shows the seemingly arbitrary slaying of Iraqi civilians, among them two Reuters journalists. Take into consideration the unscrupulous radio messages of the U.S. soldiers who seem to perceive this as a video game. It is worth watching the 17-18 min. completely (it is already a shortened version) – these minutes will definitely make you think!
Now, please imagine you were a member of the German government and have to co-decide about, let’s say, the military strike against Belgrade and the intervention into Kosovo, about the participation in the war against al Qaida and the Taliban in Afghanistan or about air-strikes against Muammar el Qaddafi. You have probably renounced war and everything which has to do with it several hundred times before – with thoughts comparable to mine issued before. However, now you are part of an UN system which approved, at least, the Afghanistan intervention and, to a certain extent, the bombardment of Libya. Even more importantly, you are an integral part of the world’s strongest military alliance, the NATO – your alliance, first and foremost the U.S., expects you to take part in its missions. And with your German history, it is difficult to justify a German Sonderweg (see the German abstention in the Libya case). Why should the U.S., Great Britain, Canada, and all the others sacrify their soldiers while you stay at home and criticize them?
It is relatively easy, as noted before, to spend Christmas at home, to be there at Easter, to remain your whole life in a Western society, and to advocate a war. It is, on the other hand, easy as well, to criticise a war, to deny the belligerent parties’ humanity and empathy, to brush aside the complexity of their situation, and to ignore that all their decisions – to fight a war and kill, to cancel a war and possibly risk something like a genocide - end in a tragedy that does not know a right answer.
The Russell-Einstein Manifesto stated: “Remember your humanity, and forget the rest.” If we do that, going to any war and having something like a conscience are incompatible. However, politicians, who decide about peace and war, are not only dependant on their conscience and humanity but also on lobby influences, international power relations, and own political and financial interests. I do not apologize that. However, is it adequate to just verbally (and – in the internet - often anonymously) criticise our politicians without being prepared to take on their job and make it better? If we are really serious about our dismissal of war, we have to prove that we can uphold our position even in front of lobby influences and political pressure. And we have to reconsider whether our refusal of war and our drive for fundamental human rights like freedom of speech are always compatible. I can imagine a world without war and with human rights for everyone, but I don’t know whether complete peace and universally granted human rights are achievable at the same time!?
