A WORLD WITHOUT WAR

Thanks for the valuable link. I'm going to ponder this awhile over my morning coffee. It's one thing for mankind to have it within its power - and of course it's another whole thing entirely to motivate and actually take the steps and accomplish. As stated in the last words of the article, this subject is hideously complex.

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I'm excerpting a section of that article that was very pithy:

"My sense is that, both here and in the U.S., people pay lip service to their love of peace and their belief that war is immoral, but at the same time, the threshold for going to war is actually falling.

It’s a massive contradiction. Part of what I’m trying to achieve with this book is simply to point out this gigantic chasm between our words and our actions. In a way, the United States is the problem when it comes to the persistence of war in the world today. We are engaged in two large-scale conflicts overseas, in Iraq and Afghanistan. We’re the largest arms dealer in the world. We have a massive military budget. China’s military is minuscule compared to ours, I think their army is about one-sixth or one-seventh the size of ours in terms of defense spending. Yet we say that we are a people of peace. And, you can of course make a moral case for some of our conflicts.

But if your goal is to move the world to a state beyond militarism, you have to find other ways of dealing with problems. I point out in my book that prior to World War I, you could actually find a lot of respected intellectuals and political leaders going on about war’s glories − how it built morale, and made men out of boys, and the like. If there’s any benefit of World Wars I and II, these massive, industrial-scale slaughterhouses, it’s that they have dispelled to some extent those romantic illusions we had about war as the ultimate game.

Say we do get rid of war. Won’t it be possible for certain states or corporations to dominate the world − even effectively control people’s thoughts − with technology and globalization?"

Yeah, that passage struck me, too. Especially pointing out that there are other ways of dealing with problems other than wars. Libya is a good example. Got-daffy had been sponsoring terrorism, setting up camps for them, training them, financing their activities--and bombing the bejesus out of Tripoli didn't do a damned bit of good. But the sanctions which were instituted against Libya in 1986, and the gradual increase in pressure on Got-Daffy evenually lead to them giving up two Libyans alleged to have been behind the Lockerbie bombing, shutting down the training camps, expelling the alleged terrorists and making a formal renunciation of weapons of mass destruction development programs and missile development programs to the United Nations--in 2003. People can't seem to understand that you can't get instant results without war, and that war changes the circumstances so much, that you get a train-load of other problems not associated with the issue which initially lead to war.

It's a good interview, i hope others will read it and comment.

I read and then re-read such an article. Seems that my brain got denser as I aged.

Big implications from this issue are now more important than ever as Iran tightens the screws on its threat to close off oil from passing through at the Straits of Hormuz. The powers that be are not quite like Gaddafi - meaning i think they'll be a lot harder to control.

What's the upshot of such a move and blockage? Because a large majority of the world's petrol flows through there, this is strategic and vital to the economies of US and EU and the world. There is an US aircraft carrier steaming its way over to the area as we speak. They'll just park it there ... ya know?

No war...no militarism..right? Just a parking lesson for the scrubs?

Yes, yes, yes, oh please yes!
Wouldn't that be wonderful?

.... & I haven't even read the article yet .... (I'll do that now.)
I just felt so exhilarated by the thread title!

I'm with this guy.
The sad thing is that the idea of a world without war would sound nuts to many people who have been around since a fair part of the 2oth Century .... because they have kept happening, despite what so many have wanted.

The problem, as I see it, is that ordinary people have so little real influence over such things.
We march, we protest, we take over the streets of the cities of the world in our millions, to say that we don't want the war in <insert country> to happen.
But to no avail. Fresh wars happened anyway, often in countries with some of the poorest people in the world, attacked by far wealthier countries for ideological or pretty obscure reasons.
It doesn't appear to matter who governs the war mongering countries, in the west, anyway. The outcome is the same.

So as I said, I agree with John Horgan's thinking, we need a serious change of mind-set about the inevitability of war. I don't think that that would be too hard to achieve for ordinary citizens, in the west, especially.
But the real challenge it seems to me: how to change the mind-set of those to whom war is a lucrative business, those with such a powerful hold over our "leaders"?
That is a far, far tougher proposition.
And I suspect that is the key.
-

When I read it, I was a little taken aback that he only took into account Europe and the US. I think there are people/nations that are far more accepting of Peace than his limited choices.

Certainly there are quite a lot of people who have a vested interest in war--the arms manufacturers, obviously, but also, in the west, a growing contracting industry which supplies everything from soup to nuts--logistical systems, construction systems and materials, security services, even air travel for combatants. These people not only have a vested interest, they have the money to buy government attention that thousands of ordinary people in the streets don't get.

Imagine there's no countries
It isn't hard to do
Nothing to kill or die for
And no religion too
Imagine all the people
Living life in peace...

It's one thing ridiculing him while he's alive, but he's dead now. You should show a bit of respect, and give the melty-faced bastard a break.

Libya is an example that pales into insignificance when compared to the US. Why don't you discuss the US, Set?

This stunning level of hypocrisy never ceases to amaze.

The essential premise is correct: If humans reject war, there will be no war.

I agree that there isn't a biological imperative for war that can't be resisted.

The notion, however, that all it will take is a concerted effort of will to end wars is absurd.

Even if every man, woman and child in the Western world rejected warfare, warfare would not end.

What's more, the minute The West publicly rejects warfare, it's enemies will go to war against it.

The author has studied a social imperative without paying attention to the more powerful, underlying social imperatives.

Let's assume this guy's book has a miraculous effect on the population of the Western World and they all reject warfare. That will only hold up as long as war is not brought to their shores by Eastern enemies.

No manner of philosophical argument is going to convince the majority of losers in a war that they need to get over it and accept their fate.

Left or Right, no one will glorify such a surrender.

The author's argument could prove effective if all the world's players share the same value judgments.

Of course they don't.

Thus the long term goal of the global culture requires that all of thes 3rd World countries abandon the violence that is, clearly, to their advantage.

They will not unless some external force makes it worse for them to do so.

Here is the joke. What nation is willing to back up their opposition with force?

Very, very few, because they are paralyzed by charges of colonialism.

Arguing an end to war is not only a noble gesture, it could actualy be possible if an overwhleming participation of voters decided that we shouldn't gieve a **** about the dead and maimed s0ldiers we sent to Ira3

It will indeed take a concerted effort, but we wouldn't even be having this talk if it weren't for the long running naked aggression of the US against weaker nations solely to steal their wealth.

While the effort will have to be concerted, it really is so simple. Demand honesty of yourselves and your rulers. Demand they stop the carnage. Show a little humility. What's a couple thousand Americans compared to the millions that Americans have murdered, including their own?

War will never end because there will always be greedy, immoral fucks.

But you so casually stain the word 'war'. The US has been involved in only two wars that had any degree of justification. The rest have been naked aggression for profit.

Notice that there's no Guatemalan War or Nicaraguan War or Cuban War, or Chilean War or Brazilian War. Why? Because they were simply brutal incursions for, dare I say it again, need I say it again, to steal the wealth of other peoples.